All That Is And Used To Be
by Misato
Summary: Dean never even knew anyone was living in the old estate outside of town until its mysterious occupant contracts his shop for a very specific job: a custom piano bench with grooves cut into the back. There are secrets that will not stay hidden and stories that refuse to be forgotten - especially when they involve Dean Winchester and the angel Castiel. Vague spoilers through S8.
1. Chapter 1

"Can you complete this project or not?"

Dean turned the design sketch around, checking out the dimensions. "I mean, yeah, the project's not a big deal. Surprised you didn't go to someone who specializes in this stuff, you musicians are usually a lot pickier."

"You came very highly recommended."

Dean raised an eyebrow at that but let it pass without comment. "How did you get my name again, anyway?" He did good work, Dean had no doubts about that but he ran a small shop and didn't spend much on advertising.

"As I said. You came highly recommended."

Dean shook his head, smoothing the sketch flat against the glass coffee table. Or crystal, maybe, the set wasn't quite right for glass. Either way, he could tell at a glance the table was probably worth more than what he'd made in the past six months, just like everything else in the sitting room. Dean usually had a policy against taking on the really wealthy as clients, the hassle was never worth the money, but when he'd gotten the call that morning his curiosity had gotten the better of him. "Didn't even know anyone was in this old place," he said.

"I live a quiet life."

Dean tried to study his prospective client without being obvious about it. It was true that he'd had no idea anyone was living in the old mansion outside the town line; the place dated back to the Kansas territory days, maybe the oldest standing building in the state. He'd assumed for years the historical society had been keeping it up, not that it was inhabited. There weren't even power lines connecting it to the town grid, although Dean supposed there must be a generator because power was coming from somewhere.

And the mansion's resident was just as strange. Dean had walked in expecting some old recluse but Castiel (no last name, and Dean hadn't pressed) looked to be around his age, wearing a dark suit even though it was the height of summer and the mansion didn't have air conditioning. Dean guessed the recluse part of his guess had been right, at least; Castiel hadn't even stepped out of the door to greet him when Dean had arrived, buzzing him in at the gate. And that was even without the direct staring going on; it was like he'd never gotten the hang of eye contact and personal space.

But hey, weird and rich tended to go hand in hand and just looking at the terms of this contract Dean had the feeling this guy was very, very rich. "You have reservations," Castiel said, letting out a frustrated huff of breath.

"Yeah, you could say that."

"If there are problems with the sketch I could..."

"Nah," Dean said, shaking his head. "I've worked from worse. It's not the project, it's the terms."

He watched Castiel ruffle up like an agitated cat. "If you require more compensation, that can be discussed."

Dean just shook his head again. "Look, don't think I'm against you throwing money at me but this whole thing about doing all the work on site," he said, pointing to the clause in the contract, "that's no good."

Castiel frowned. "I could make any accommodations you require."

"That's not it. Look, I've been doing this a long time, you want this done right it needs be in a proper shop. Wood reacts to all kinds of things, humidity, all of that. I can't just set up a saw in the driveway and expect that to work."

Castiel's lips thinned but he didn't make another argument. "Aside from that, do you have any other concerns?"

Dean examined the sketch again. "Well, I've never made a piano bench before but it doesn't look that complicated. What's with these cut outs along the back?" he said, pointing to the two triangular indentations on the sketch.

"They're required."

"Okay, okay. Just means I'd have to adjust the storage area underneath, there's a reason these things usually aren't made like that."

Castiel nodded, fidgeting like he wasn't sure what he was supposed to do with his hands. "I apologize if I'm coming across as difficult."

"If I didn't want to deal with difficult clients I wouldn't do custom work," Dean said. A part of him wasn't sure why he still sitting here – this was more trouble than Dean cared to go through to get work, even when he needed the money. Everything about Castiel just screamed how uncomfortable he was, from the stiff way he held himself to the eye contact. Dean had worked with some awkward clients in his time but never someone who looked like he was being tortured just by sitting down to discuss the estimate. "I'm not saying no, okay? Just that you've got to compromise."

"You drive difficult bargains," Castiel murmured. "Does the privacy clause meet with your approval?"

"Yeah, whatever, I don't talk shop with my competitors anyway."

"That's not what I mean. I don't want my name spoken to anyone. I value my privacy."

That got a raised eyebrow out of Dean. "To _anyone_? If my brother calls up and asks what I'm working on, you mean I can't tell him?"

Castiel did that uncomfortable fidget again. "I...I suppose you don't need to go to that extreme. Just leaving my name out of the conversation should suffice there."

Dean shrugged. "Hey, you're the client. You're providing materials, you said?"

Castiel nodded. "You'll be allowed to examine them, of course." There was a little tinge of excitement in that direct stare now. "Does that mean you'll accept the commission?"

"Leaning more toward yes than no."

"How long do you think the project will take?"

Dean tilted his head. "There's a lot of hand carving. A week, I guess? At the most?"

Castiel lowered his eyes, and Dean couldn't tell if he was happy about that estimate or not. He closed his eyes for a moment, his hands steepled under his chin. "Is the on-site provision your only pressing concern?"

"That's the big one, yeah."

Castiel nodded. "Then come with me."

Dean followed him through a winding hallway, the walls covered with art that even to Dean's untrained eye looked like museums would be lining up to get their hands on. "Are all these real?"

"I can provide the provenance if you'd like."

"No, I believe you." He stopped in front of what was unmistakably a Van Gogh. "My brother went on an art kick when he was twelve or so, I can recognize some of the big names." He glanced down at the gallery behind him. "Pretty sure there's enough money in this hallway to buy the town."

"I've put a lot of time into my collection," Castiel said, sounding pleased with himself. "But there are less 'masters' represented than you might expect. I buy whatever catches my eye. History forgets more talent than it remembers."

"Must be nice."

"If I can't create great art I can at least collect it." He paused by a door at the end of the stairs. "Tell me if this meets your standards." He pushed open the door and stepped aside, allowing Dean to step inside first.

Dean felt like he'd stepped backwards in time. He found himself in a fully-equipped workshop – an antique one, to be sure, but one just as beautiful as any of the paintings hanging in the hall. Castiel was at his elbow before Dean even realized he'd entered the room. "If I double the offered fee, would working here suffice?"

Dean nodded.

888

"Tell me you said no. Tell me you said no and ran out of there as fast as you could."

Dean leaned against the kitchen table and rubbed his suddenly aching forehead with his free hand. Sam hadn't been...exactly as positive as Dean had felt driving away from Castiel's mansion and hadn't wasted any words during the phone call letting Dean know it. "Dude. It is a _lot_ of money."  
"There's no way it could possibly be enough money."

Dean pulled out the wad of cash Castiel had given him when they'd concluded business that morning, half of his estimated fee straight up in advance. Normally he dealt in checks but Cas had just blinked at him when he'd brought up the possibility. It wasn't the first time he'd had a client pay him in cash, some of the ones on the wealthier side liked to flash their money at any opportunity but he hadn't gotten the feeling this was showing off. He wondered if the guy even had a bank account. Money was just literally lining the walls of that mansion, for all he knew. "I don't know, Sam. If it's not it's pretty close."

"I thought you said the shop was doing okay."

"Dude, it is but with the way things have been lately there's no way I'm turning down someone _literally_ throwing money at me. And I mean actually tossing a money clip full of hundreds at me as I was leaving."

"And none of this strikes you as even a little bit weird?"

Dean sat down, propping up his head with one hand. "It's a lot weird. I know that, but what do you want me to do?"

"Not work for crazy people would be a good start."

"He's not crazy. Weird, sure, but I'm not getting crazy off him."

"Dean. I want you to really look at the terms he set for you and tell me that again. He won't let you _say his name out loud_."

Okay, so maybe Sam had a little bit of a point there. "When you're that rich you're allowed to be a little nuts."

"He built a 19th century woodshop in his house so you wouldn't have to leave."

Dean smiled just thinking about that shop. "Place is fucking beautiful, Sam. I feel like I went back in time, it's like I'm working in a museum."

"But, you know. Not crazy."

"Fine. But not dangerous crazy." If Sam kept making points Dean felt like he was going to have to pull some older brother rank because there was no way he was going to be talked into giving this money back. "You didn't talk to him, Sam. Dude is _awkward_. I got the feeling the whole time it had been so long since he'd talked to anyone that he didn't really remember how." Dean realized as he said that it didn't really do anything to disprove Sam's argument.

Sam didn't miss it either. "Dean. Listen to yourself."

Definitely time to pull rank. "I took the job, Sam. I'm not backing out now, you know I don't do that." And he wasn't giving this money back, but he didn't really feel the need to say that.

Sam let out the most long-suffering of his vast array of long-suffering sighs. "Fine. At least send me the contract so I can get an idea of how much crazy we're dealing with." Dean could actually _hear_ Sam's forehead do that worried scrunched-up thing when Dean didn't say anything. "Dean, tell me there's actually a contract."

"More of a handshake deal." Not that they'd actually shaken on anything, Cas had given a definite _hands off_ vibe, but he was far from the first client of Dean's to have that particular flavor of weird.

Another sigh, louder and more tragic than the first. "Just promise me that if he offers to play an opera he wrote specifically for you that you'll jump in the car and get out of there."

"He's not the Phantom, Sam, he's just a guy. A weird, rich guy."

"I didn't think you'd get that."

"Hey. I got some culture."

"Cool, next time Jess wants to see it again you can go with her."

"See? I got more than you." He could tell Sam was still worried – Sam worried like it was an Olympic sport sometimes – but that he was going to let it drop for the moment, which Dean guessed he could count as a win. "How's the studying for the bar going?" he said, deliberately changing the subject.

"Gonna get a zero."

Dean grinned. Sam had never failed a test in his life. "You're gonna pass on the first try and save the world from corporate douchebags."

"That's the plan." Dean heard some noise in the background. "I gotta get going, Jess just got home and we're having dinner with her parents tonight."

"Tell her she's too good for you for me."

"Man, don't I know it. You don't check in after a couple of days and I'm going to assume you've been kidnapped and fly out there."

Dean knew Sam would, too. "I'll talk to you later." After Sam hung up Dean put the phone down and picked up the wad of cash, counting through the hundred dollar bills as if he expected them to turn into singles before finally just putting it aside.

Sam was right, of course. This _was_ a pretty strange set up, way more hoops than Dean would usually care to jump through and he'd never been swayed by the promise of some quick cash before. And actually he hadn't been now – Cas had been the one to bring up this payment when Dean had completely forgotten about it as he'd been gathering up his stuff to leave. If Dean was going to be honest with himself he knew he probably would have done this job for half the fee.

Dean realized then he'd started thinking of Castiel as "Cas" in his head. He tried to remember when that had started and couldn't. He'd have to be careful not to call Castiel that when he showed up there in the morning.

Dean put all of that out of his head and decided to knock off early. He had a long day in front of him after all.

888

Dean woke in the middle of the night sweating and gasping, his sheets wrapped around his legs and the blanket kicked to the floor. He took a moment to catch his breath, stretching out across the bed, his heart beating a fast rhythm in his chest. The dream that had shaken him awake was still there behind his eyes, Castiel under him in the backseat of the Impala. They'd pulled over at some rest stop, like they'd been in the middle of some road trip; Dean felt his hands clench in the sheets as he remembered Cas shaking in the dream as he whispered Dean's name like some hedonistic prayer.

He pushed the dream aside as he tried to get back to sleep. Maybe obscene amounts of money weren't the only reason he'd taken this job after all.


	2. Chapter 2

Dean almost didn't show up at the job site the next morning. He never had managed to get back to sleep and just walking around felt like slogging through mud, and that was even without the details of that dream sitting behind his eyes like an insistent heckler. It wasn't so much that the dream had been about a guy...okay, there was maybe a little bit to that if he was going to be honest but it wasn't _just_ that. The much bigger issue was that having that kind of dream about someone he was going to have to see every day was just awkward as hell. Dean had slept with clients before and it always turned out bad; this had the potential to be a major windfall but if he was going to screw it up he'd rather do it by backing out than by thinking with his dick. Again.

But he'd already taken the money. Dean finally decided that he'd drive back out there and give it one day. That should be enough to tell him if that dream had just been some weird brain misfire or something he'd actually have to look out for, and if worse came to worst he could just give back the money and make a referral. And even with giving himself that pep talk the whole way to the edge of town and down that long road to the wrought iron gate Dean's palms were still sweating when he pressed the button on the intercom. A few seconds passed, long enough that Dean started to wonder if the thing was broken, then he heard Castiel's scratchy voice over the speaker. "Yes?"

Dean could swear it was like he'd never used the damn thing before. "You want me to start work you've gotta let me in first."

"Oh." He almost sounded surprised. "Of course."

Dean heard a metallic creak, then the gate slowly opened inwards. "Man, the things people spend money on," Dean said under his breath, rolling up the window and stepping on the gas. He parked his car in the covered garage – it was practically as big as the house itself – and Dean let himself stroll around for a few minutes. Castiel's car collection was even prettier than his art collection, full of beautiful muscle cars and immaculate old roadsters, all gleaming like they were new from the factory. It almost made Dean feel a little sad after a while, the thought of all these cars sitting there like museum pieces with no one to drive them. "Maybe if I ask nice Cas'll let me take you for a spin, huh girl?" he said, running one hand along the trim of a gorgeous old Firebird. It was one thing to keep a painting hanging on a wall but a good car was meant to be used.

Dean found Castiel waiting for him in the shop when he finally managed to tear himself away. "I was beginning to think you'd reconsidered."

"Yeah, sorry. Your car collection was calling to me."

That seemed to mollify him. "Does it meet your approval?"

"They're pretty, don't get me wrong but I always felt like cars that nice were meant to be driven, not just looked at."

Castiel's expression closed and Dean knew insulting the boss on the first day probably wasn't the best idea he'd ever had. But hell, it was true and he'd say it again. Then to his surprise Castiel looked down at the floor, his brows furrowing almost like he was embarrassed. "I don't...actually know how."

"Seriously? My old man started me learning how to drive when I was twelve."

There was almost something rueful in the twist of Castiel's lips now. "Teaching me that wasn't very high on my father's list of priorities."

This was all getting dangerously close to weird personal spaces and Dean knew he should be backing all the way up. Fuck, though, that was one of the saddest things Dean had ever heard. "I could teach you," he said, feeling himself flush bright red when Castiel's head snapped up in surprise. Dean didn't even know why the hell he'd said that. "Taught my brother," he said, shrugging to make it seem like no big deal. "Shouldn't take too long."

"Would you add that to your fee?"

"Man, I'd do it just for a chance to get into one of those cars."

"Would you like one? We can make that a bonus."

Dean wondered what it would be like to be so rich he could just give away classic cars to people he'd just met. "Wouldn't want to make my baby jealous," he finally said. "Noticed you didn't have any like her in there."

"I've never found one I cared for," he said, just dismissive enough to get Dean's hackles up. No one insulted his car, he didn't care how many zeroes were on their bank statements.

"She'll out perform anything you've got rusting away."

"Perhaps that's the one I've been looking for, then."

There was something almost sly in the sideways look Castiel gave him that Dean got a kick out of. He wondered when was the last time Castiel had let himself break out of his shell like this,awkward attempts at banter and all. "You don't have that much money. _God_ doesn't have that much money."

Castiel seemed pleased with that answer but turned away, trailing his fingertips against the top of the worktable. "I shouldn't be distracting you," he said. "I'm sure you want to get started." He was out of the room before Dean could say a word in response, like he was having trouble even _looking_ at Dean. Dean shook his head as he got to laying out his tools and tried to figure out what he might have said to get that kind of reaction. Eventually when all he could up with was "Man, that guy is strange," he stopped trying and went to work, measuring out the pieces that would become the seat of the bench and the legs over the next few days. He felt a little giddy getting to work with such nice stuff; lots of wealthy clients tried to chintz out on materials but Cas hadn't even blinked. Dean let himself indulge in another "Man, that must be nice," moment before shaking it off and putting his goggles on. His father had taught him that it didn't matter what a job was or who it was for, you either put one hundred percent of yourself into it or you didn't even bother, and the last thing Dean needed was for his old man's ghost to show up in his dreams that night and start lecturing him.

And anyway, he'd spotted the shadow in the hallway. If Cas was going to lurk around and supervise, Dean certainly didn't want him to think he wasn't getting all the effort he'd paid for.

888

This went on without Dean commenting on it for the next few days. And actually Dean didn't mind it all that much; it _was_ a little uncomfortable, Cas just watching him on and off as he worked – but he was the client and at least he was quiet about it. And Dean never got the feeling he was being inspected, like Castiel was waiting to catch him screwing up. Cas was just quietly watching and while Dean supposed it was a little exasperating he never really worked up the urge to tell Cas to knock it off.

Usually, anyway. Today Dean had forgotten his belt sander, his shoulders ached from hunching over the work bench and his hand was getting stiff from hand carving all of this detail. His nerves were a little shot and every little thing had the potential to set him off; Dean knew that if he didn't do _something_ he was going to blow his temper at his lurking, eavesdropping client and that would just be bad for his business. Sam would never stop making fun of him. "Hey," Dean said, finally setting the dowel down and raking one hand through his hair. "I know you're standing around out there, c'mere for a second."

Castiel took a sideways step into the door frame, looking equally embarrassed and annoyed that Dean had caught him. "I didn't think you knew I was there."

"Yeah, you're not nearly as sneaky as you think you are," Dean said, trying to flex some of the ache out of his hand. "Hold this straight. If you're not going to let me bring along any assistants you're going to have to volunteer for the job."

Castiel held the piece of wood like he was very concerned it might catch fire. "I...I don't know how useful I can be..."

"It's not hard, you just have to hold it. My hand's cramping up and I don't want to risk anything slipping." Castiel nodded, getting a firmer grip. Without thinking Dean reached over and adjusted his grip, saying, "A little lower," before feeling Castiel tense up. Dean froze for an instant then slowly moved his hand away, trying to keep the eye contact steady. "You okay?" Castiel nodded once, way too quickly; forget okay, the guy looked like he was on the verge of a full-on panic attack. "I shouldn't have done that-"

"You didn't do anything wrong," Castiel said, closing his eyes for a moment as he visibly pulled himself together. "_I_ apologize. I'm out of practice."

"Out of practice with what?"

"_People_." He shook his head. "Show me what to do."

Dean walked him through the steps, waiting for Cas to nod his understanding and absolutely not touching him. And he wasn't a bad assistant, all things considered; he listened at least, which was more than Dean could say for some of the guys he'd hired over the years. "So when did you move into this old place? I'm surprised I didn't hear about it, someone buying it must have been a big deal."

The expression on Castiel's face was almost a smile, almost but not quite and Dean didn't like it at all. "I've lived in this city longer than you have. Or just outside of it, anyway."

"Bullshit." Cas just looked up at him, one eyebrow raised. "Okay fine, maybe not but you didn't live _here_."

"I remember where I've lived, Dean."

"But we used to tell ghost stories about this place. We'd dare the younger kids to sneak in and spend the night on Halloween."

That brought out a real smile on Castiel's face, if a fleeting one. "People still do. I make sure to leave the gate and doors unlocked."

"Dude, c'mon. My brother Sam did that once, I know the place was vacant then."

Castiel leaned against the work bench for a moment, crossing his arms. "I think I remember that," he said, his brow furrowed in thought. "He and two other boys. I kept the lights off and turned them off whenever the clock struck the half hour, first one room, then two, until all the lights in the wing were off except the one in the room they were in. When the clock struck again I shut everything off and two of them ran. Sam was the only one who stayed the entire night that year. " He looked right at Dean, that sly look back in his eyes. "Does that sound familiar, or am I thinking of the wrong Halloween?"

Dean actually felt a little queasy, because that sounded _exactly_ like the story Sam had come home with that morning. "Why didn't you tell them to get the hell out?"

Castiel shrugged. "They enjoyed themselves and it was harmless. There are worse things that can happen on Halloween."

"Yeah, but we only did that stuff because we didn't think anyone lived here."

"I didn't want anyone to know I lived here, so that worked out for everyone."

"Weren't your parents pissed, though?" Castiel looked away and Dean immediately wished he could take that one back. "Fuck. I'm sorry."

"It's more of an estrangement and don't be, I'm not." He let out a long breath. "I wanted to be left alone and letting most people believe I was a ghost in an empty museum piece accomplished that nicely. And I have plenty of resources to make sure anyone else can stay away."

"Then why am I here?"

Castiel looked down at the half-constructed bench. "Because I needed this built and couldn't do it myself."

And that almost made sense, except... "So why just not commission it out and have it delivered? Why the stipulation that I have to do everything here." Castiel didn't answer and he didn't look at Dean. "You look like you're about the same age as me, give or take. How come I never saw you at school, or even just around?"

"I was educated elsewhere," he said, a faintly bitter inflection to the words.

Dean was sure he didn't want the answer to his next question. "How long has it been since you've been out of this house, Cas?"

Castiel didn't say anything for a few long, long moments, which Dean took as good of an answer as any. He'd turned away to try to let the awkward moment settle when Castiel spoke up again, his voice dry as gravel. "Why did you call me that?"

Dean winced. He hadn't even realized that had slipped out. "Sorry. I won't again."

"I didn't..." Castiel shook his head again. "If I make you uncomfortable I'll free you from the work site provision."

"Dude. Did I say I was uncomfortable? I've got no problems being here. And at this point it would be a huge pain in the ass to transfer everything to my shop anyway. Okay?" Castiel nodded, looking like he was starting to get his equilibrium back. "You're right though, you're definitely out of practice."

"I'm not sure I was ever actually in practice," Castiel said, the almost rueful tone in his voice letting Dean know they'd made it out of that rough patch. "Tell me about your family. Your brother."

Dean grinned, "Yeah, what a brat he is. He's out in California."

"How did your parents meet?"

"Huh?"

"I'm very curious."

Dean shrugged. "Sometime before my dad went off to 'Nam. It's funny, they always said they couldn't stand each other at first and then a few months go by and they can't stay away from each other."

"I find that very interesting."

"That's...kind of weird."

"I didn't mean...," Castiel said, visibly flailing for a change in topic. "You and your brother seem close."

"Yeah," Dean said, leaning back against the counter. "Always us against the world in a way, y'know?" Dean winced. "Nah, probably you don't."

"Why 'against the world'?"

Dean shook his head. "Don't know, really. I mean, Mom and Dad didn't have the perfect marriage or anything, but it's not like anything bad ever really happened. It just felt normal that way." He wished he'd brought some beers. "Sam's got this girl he's been with since college, so she's practically family. Sam even bought a ring for her but he keeps chickening out when it comes time to pop the question."

"Why do you think that is?"

"Hell if I know, I've gotten on his case about it often enough. He said he gets a bad feeling when he thinks about it, like something bad's going to happen."

That seemed to bother Castiel for reasons Dean couldn't fathom. "Can we continue the lesson?"

Dean grinned at that; throwing in a little Woodshop 101 would make the job take longer but not by too much, and he'd always gotten a kick out of seeing rich guys getting their hands dirty. "Hey," he said, after a few quiet minutes. "Sorry I used to throw rocks at your windows when I was a kid. I wouldn't have done it if I'd known anyone lived here."

"Windows are easily fixed." The corners of his lips tipped up. "I still have some of the rocks."

Dean wondered if Castiel had them displayed somewhere, maybe next to some more ridiculously expensive paintings. After letting a few more minutes pass Dean carefully reached out to adjust his grip again, deliberately this time and going slowly enough that Castiel could pull away if he wanted to.

That he didn't made Dean's heart pound; he couldn't remember the last time just touching someone had gotten under his skin like this, not even as a teenager, and didn't know what was up with him. He held the contact a few seconds longer than necessary and for the rest of the day kept noticing Castiel's hands, long slim fingers. He tried not to think about what he'd like Castiel to do with those fingers and knew what he'd be dreaming about that night.


	3. Chapter 3

Dean hadn't expected the piano to be so _big_.

He'd come around to double check the dimensions on the bench before fitting all the pieces together – Castiel's blueprints had been pretty clear but clients over and underestimated measurements all the time – and Dean had to admit, the piano was pretty impressive looking. He'd only been around the smaller stand up ones before but this was a concert grand and to Dean's eye looked almost twice the size. It looked more like a set piece in a James Bond film than a thing someone would actually use. Dean wondered how many people bought these just to feel sophisticated.

Dean shook that off and got to work, stepping back to eyeball how the bench in the workshop would look in front of it when he was done. The measurements he was working from looked to be about a square inch or so bigger than the bench it would be replacing but the new one would also have those cut outs in the back, so Dean thought to the eye it might even out. He walked back over and examined the existing bench, wanting to confirm he was keeping the height the same. He didn't even know why Castiel was replacing it; he'd expected to come in to find it broken or built poorly but he couldn't find so much as a scratch in the finish. He wondered why Castiel hadn't just contacted whoever had made this in the first place for a replacement. Maybe if it was an heirloom that wasn't an option; he couldn't see a date stamp but just from the construction Dean could tell it was old, maybe old enough to have been built in a shop like the one he was working in now.

He sat on the bench to test if maybe that was why it needed to be replaced but couldn't feel any give. Dean finally shrugged and gave up trying to figure out how Castiel thought; he was being paid a lot but nowhere near that much.

The lid to the keyboard was open and Dean couldn't resist the temptation to touch the keys, pressing one down slowly and getting a soft, barely audible note in return. He tried again with a little more force and the note came through louder; he pressed two random keys down and the same time and winced when the notes clashed into discordant noise.

"Would you like me to teach you?"

Dean almost jumped out of his skin, his hand slamming down so hard on the keyboard that he could feel the vibrations. "Shit," he said, pulling the lid down over the keys like a guilty kid putting the lid back on the cookie jar. "Don't _do_ that. Where did you come from, anyway?"

"The other room," Castiel said, walking over to stand behind Dean. "I didn't say you had to stop," he said, reaching past Dean to raise the lid again.

"Yeah, you should. I don't have the ear for this."

Castiel shook his head. "You don't need an 'ear.' Playing by ear is an impressive parlor trick but that's all. Anyone can learn how to read music and from there it's all just practice and repetition."

"I get the feeling that's easy for you to say," Dean said, conscious of the way Castiel was leaning over him.

"I'm not saying there's no such thing as natural talent or that anyone can compose, but it's just not as mysterious or...I don't know. Romantic as some people would like it to be. Just because one person will be better at interpreting a piece doesn't mean they both can't learn it." Castiel tilted his head, like he was watching Dean's reaction. "So would you like to learn?"

Dean wasn't sure he could say no even if he'd wanted to, Cas clearly wanted to teach him so badly. Cas took his silence as assent and moved back behind him. He wrapped both hands around Dean's wrists and arranged his hands at the middle of the keyboard. "Start from from this position, especially when you're first learning. Think of it like the home keys for a typist."

"I don't know how to type, either."

Dean felt him press closer behind him, which he didn't think was strictly necessary for this lesson but he certainly wasn't going to complain. Castiel covered Dean's hands with his own, hesitating just the slightest instant before making contact. This was the most they'd touched since the day Dean walked in the door, and certainly the most Castiel had initiated. Dean was afraid to breathe too loud in case that messed up whatever this was.

He felt Castiel press his thumb down, creating the same soft note as when he first started playing around with the piano. "That's Middle C." Castiel's voice always sounded like he drank whiskey for breakfast but it sounded rougher than Dean had ever heard it now, like he was forcing out each word. "Think of that as a boundary that divides the treble and bass clefs and what your right and left hands are doing, especially at the beginning. From there it's D," he said, pressing down Dean's index finger. "Then E, F, G, A, B. Then just repeat."

"Why not start at A, then?"

"Because you don't." He walked Dean through playing the series of notes again. "There are other scales but C is the one you start with. The black keys are in-between notes," he said, moving Dean's hand to press down the black key between C and D. "That key is either C sharp or D flat, depending on the key the music is written in. Sharp if the note is one step forward, flat if it's one back."

Cas' voice this close to his ear was making it very hard to focus on the details of when a note was sharp or not. "All right. Sounds good to me."

Castiel moved Dean's right hand up the keyboard a bit and had him play a series of notes that sounded familiar to Dean, B, B flat, B, B flat, A, F. "Congratulations," Cas said. "You just played the opening to Fur Elise. Everyone seems to learn that one first."

"Think we'd both be better off with you playing and me listening."

"I never play in front of people."

Dean almost blurted out _why not_ but stopped himself just in time; the glimpses behind Castiel's walls he'd gotten so far told him there was probably a fucking depressing story behind that and he liked the mood they were in the middle of too much to shatter it. "Letting the piano just sit around gathering dust is almost as bad as the cars, you know."

"I didn't say I never played, just not in front of people," he said, guiding Dean through a slightly more complicated scale. "I enjoy playing. I don't have the talent to compose my own unfortunately, so I trained myself to play as well as I could so at least I could do credit to the work of others." He went quiet for a few moments, helping Dean fumble through another scale. "I admit, I envy you."

"Me? Why?"

"You can create something beautiful and lasting out of raw materials that are worthless on their own. Everything in my gallery was nothing but paint and canvas until the artist touched it. I don't have that kind of gift. I can recognize and admire it but I can't do it myself." He lowered his eyes. "That's why I watch you work," he admitted. "To see that happen."

"It's really not that hard, y'know. Just give it a shot."

"I know my limitations."

Not much to argue with there. "Why do you even have me making you a new bench, anyway? There's nothing wrong with this one."

Castiel shook his head. "I need one more suitable." He pulled back a little bit, resting his hands on Dean's forearms. "Try it once by yourself."

Even though he could do it by himself – it was just a scale, Dean knew that even with his limited musical ability knew he could handle that – he made himself fumble halfway through and Castiel's hands were back over his. "Like this," he said, guiding Dean through the rest. When that was done neither of them moved, Dean because his entire mission in life had suddenly become not screwing up whatever this was and Castiel because Dean could tell the realization of how close he was to Dean had just reached up and grabbed him by the throat. Cas' hands were trembling on top of Dean's to the point that all Dean wanted was to grab them and hold them still. If he leaned his head back he could see that Cas' lips were parted and Dean's mind flooded with vivid images of what it would be like to feel those lips move beneath his. If he moved his head less than an inch over Dean knew he could find out, Cas was standing that close. Dean thought about the loneliness and complete isolation that filled every word Dean managed to pry out of Castiel and wondered how long it had been since he'd even let another person get this close. What had finally led him to cracking up enough to even let someone in and how fucking terrifying that must have been, and most importantly how much he would mind if Dean grabbed him by his hair, threw him against this piano and kissed him until Cas forgot how to breathe.

Dean felt his self-control slowly pull taut until his skin felt like it was going to split open if he didn't move, but then he felt Cas let out a soft breath and pull away, like he'd snapped out of a trance. "You okay?" Dean said, amazed at how normal his voice sounded.

Castiel nodded, looking a few hundred miles south of okay. "I'm fine," he said, the rasp in his voice all but swallowing the words. "I'll let you get back to work."

He was gone before Dean could even think of anything to say. Dean was tempted to follow him and demand to know what the hell was going on, what _was_ that, but he didn't know what was going in his own head right now, let alone anyone else's.

888

"Do not fuck this guy because you feel sorry for him."

"Sam!"

"It is good advice and you should take it."

Dean rested his head in one hand because, yeah, that probably was good advice right now. "I don't feel sorry for him. I mean, not just, I guess."

Sam was quiet for a few long, _long_ seconds. "Jesus. Dean, I was _kidding_." He could hear a scraping sound, like Sam had needed to pull out a chair and sit down. "You're really thinking about doing this."

Dean didn't tell Sam that lately it was the only thing he could think about. "I feel bad for him because it seems like his life absolutely sucked up til now but Sam, man, the guy's trying."

"He pulled your name out of the phone book."

"Yeah, I know. When they make the made for TV movie about this you can play yourself and say you told me so."

"This is a terrible coming out speech."

"It's not...what?" It took a few seconds for Dean's brain to process that. "I'm not..." He didn't finish the thought because sure, maybe that was what this was. Hell if Dean knew. "We cool?"

"Why...wouldn't we be?"

The clear _the hell is wrong with you?_ tone in Sam's voice took some of the weight off because yeah, of course they were. Dean felt dumb for even asking. "This is hitting me like a ton of bricks, Sam. I don't know what's going on in my head."

"Sometimes it's like that. The day I met Jess I knew that was it for me. Like I'd been waiting my whole life to go to that party."

Dean shook his head even though he knew Sam couldn't see it. "I don't know. I always expect things to go bad, you know that."

"And that's always worked out great, right?"

Dean supposed Sam had a point there. "So you're saying I should go for it."

"I'd be thrilled if you could just let yourself be happy for five minutes. Just don't go in thinking you can save this guy, because you might not be able to."

That got Dean's hackles up although he didn't know why. Sam was absolutely right. "I'll be careful."

"Yeah, sure you will be."

"You got no confidence in me."

"Comes from knowing you my whole life." Dean endured Sam making fun of him some more before ending the call, then sat back and tried to figure out exactly what in the hell was wrong with him. There wasn't much work left to do and a part of Dean wanted to just get the last of it done, collect his fee and never look back.

But a larger part of him thought about Castiel locked away in that old house and living like a ghost while he was still breathing, playing music no one else would ever hear and the misery of that coiled in Dean's stomach like a snake. He was convinced he was right, Cas was _trying_ to reach out, just getting freaked and pulling back at the last second.

Dean just wanted to know why.

888

The next few days went by in what passed for normal and professional – no supercharged touching, no personal conversations, not even as much lurking. Dean had decided to let Cas take the lead and if he wanted to back all the way up Dean supposed he couldn't blame him.

Then one night Dean was already more than halfway home when he realized he'd forgotten his tools - normally not a big deal, but the bench wasn't the only project Dean had on his slate. There was a small repair job he'd promised to deliver to another client in the morning and he'd hoped to finish up the detail work that night.

Dean turned the car back around, wincing when he saw the time. It was late enough that when Dean pulled he didn't see any lights on and was relieved the gate had been left open; Cas had given him a key so he could go in and out if needed and Dean circled around to the back of the property. The rear entrance was a more direct path to the workshop and Dean really wanted to avoid waking Cas up by prowling around his house at night even if he did have a key and a good reason.

Big houses were always creepy at night and Dean kept his steps quiet, navigating by the moonlight streaming through the uncovered windows. All went well until Dean passed the piano room; he heard a rustling and soft footsteps just in time and flattened himself against the wall by instinct. This was the only lit room in the house and Dean crept closer to the circle of light spilling from the doorway; there was a scraping sound Dean knew must the bench being pulled back. Dean squeezed his eyes shut; if Cas was going to practice Dean knew he should cut his losses and sneak back out.

And he was about to do just that when he heard an odd rustling sound, a soft whoosh that he couldn't place. In the second's hesitation caused by that Castiel began to play and Dean knew he wasn't going anywhere.

Any thought he'd had that maybe Cas didn't play in front of people because he just wasn't very good died right there. Dean knew he should leave, he wasn't meant to hear this – hell, he'd agreed to not hear this – but Dean couldn't make his legs move. Castiel was playing the song he'd taught Dean the first few notes of days before but the way it was really meant to be. He'd always been more of a Led Zep guy but Dean thought maybe if Cas was playing he could broaden his horizons.

He heard that rustling sound again and curiosity got the better of him. Dean peeked around the edge of the doorway, at first just being able to make out the back of the room and Castiel's suit jacket dropped in a crumpled heap on the floor. Dean took another step forward, enough to have an unobstructed view of the room, and sucked in a deep breath – Cas was sitting at the piano with his shirt sleeves pushed up and Dean suddenly understood why Castiel was so careful about letting Dean touch him. Curving up from Castiel's back just below his shoulders were a pair of immaculately white, feathered wings. "Holy shit."

Castiel's head snapped up, the wings flaring out and throwing enormous shadows against the wall. He stood up so quickly the bench tipped over. "Why are you here?"

"I forgot something. How have you been hiding those?"

Castiel shook his head, like just doing that could rewind the past few seconds. "You weren't supposed to see this."

"Yeah, I know. I wasn't trying to snoop, I swear."

"We had an _agreement_. You said you wouldn't pry like this, now I can't let you..."

"What?" Dean walked into the room, watching Castiel deflate a little bit more with each step. "Can't let me do what? Can't let me leave? Are we in that kind of movie? Should I go home and get my dungeon clothes?" Castiel looked down. "Or do you have a room all set up? Lots of candles everywhere, I bet. Always lots of candles."

Castiel kept his eyes locked on the floor. "You can't tell anyone," he said, what Dean suspected he wanted to be an order coming out as a plea. "It would attract attention, I'd have to leave and I can't, everything I have is here..."

He was spiraling down into panic right before Dean's eyes. "Hey," he said, walking up to put one hand on Cas' shoulder. "Dude. Who do you think I'm going to tell?" He dipped his head to try to force eye contact. "I'm not gonna tell anyone. I swear. Okay?" It took a few seconds but Castiel finally met his eyes. "Are these why you keep yourself locked up in here?"

"Partially. I can usually hide them but I learned a long time ago it's harder around people. It's been very hard around you," he admitted, and Dean realized the way he'd tensed up the first time Dean touched him had probably been him trying to keep the wings wrapped up.

"That's what the cut outs in the design are for," Dean realized, matching the drape of the wings to the blueprints in his shop.

Castiel nodded. "I need to focus when I play and I can't keep them hidden," he said, like he was admitting an embarrassing secret. "I thought a custom accommodation would be more comfortable."

"I guess I understand now why you didn't tell me the real reason you wanted that done," Dean said. "Probably wouldn't have believed it. Don't really see why you're keeping it a secret, though. I think they're pretty awesome."

"It's dangerous."

"Dude, what do you think people are going to do, bring out the pitchforks and the torches?"

"You're taking this _very_ well." Dean shrugged; rolling with it was the only response he could manage right now. Probably the freaking out would come later. "I don't want any attention. I just want to be able to live my live without interference, and this is the only way I know how to do that. I just want to be left alone."

"You want me to leave you alone?" Castiel didn't answer, which for him spoke volumes. "Can I touch them?" Dean blurted out, glad it came out like that because he wasn't sure he'd have been able to gather up the guts if he'd had time to think.

Castiel nodded; Dean noticed his hands were tight fists at his side and moved slowly, running just the fingertips of one hand down the expanse of white feathers. Dean thought he'd barely touched him but the whole wing quivered, a single, full-body shudder that passed through Castiel like a current. "Oh," Cas said, the word all but buried in a rough-voiced moan. "I didn't expect that."

Dean took a step closer. "Can you fly on these?" he asked, slowly closing his hand around a handful of the inner layer of feathers, his eyes locked on Castiel's face. The way his expression changed with even just the slightest touch was like a stiff drink hitting Dean's system, that same light-headed, reckless surge of energy.

"No," Castiel said, a rueful twist to his lips. "When I was younger, but not now." He let out a deep in his throat moan as Dean trailed his thumb along the top edge of the wing, his eyes squeezing shut like it was taking all of his concentration to stay upright.

"How do you even walk around with them sensitive like this?" As if to punctuate that Dean stroked his hand down the outer pin feathers, making the wing involuntarily flare out.

"You can see why I gave you the design I did," he said, leaning into the touch like an arching cat. "_This_ is why I didn't want you to see them."

"What? Why? You said I could touch them."

Castiel nodded. "I knew you would ask." He met Dean's eyes with a look that was almost helpless. "I knew I wouldn't say no."

Enough with pretending at self-control; Dean stepped forward and kissed Castiel full on the lips, a shiver of his own hitting his spine when Castiel opened to the kiss immediately. He felt Castiel's hands reach up to cradle his head, the kiss suddenly something hungry as he pressed against Dean. Even when he pulled back he was still so close Dean could feel his breath. "I _want_ you to call me Cas," he whispered, intensity putting an edge to the words. "Please call me that."

Dean leaned back into the kiss to shush him as much as anything else, getting rewarded by a low moan that sounded like it came from miles inside him. He clutched onto Dean like he needed Dean to stand, his mouth hot and and open under Dean's and his tongue in Dean's mouth like Cas had been starving for him. Dean pulled Cas' shirt out of his waistband and slid his hands underneath the thin fabric, feeling Castiel sigh as he scraped his nails very lightly along the line of his ribs. "This is very ill-advised," Cas murmured, speaking right up against Dean's lips.

"Yeah, I'm kind of the expert at that."

Dean usually prided himself on always being on time with his jobs but just this once he knew he would have to bend that rule. Something more important had just come up.


	4. Chapter 4

Construction was done, the sanding, the trim, all of it; all Dean needed to do was lacquer the bench to make it match the glossy black of the piano but there was one last step before Dean put on any finishing touches. "What do you think?" he said, hanging back as Castiel prowled around it, his wings held high on his back as he went through a pretty lengthy inspection by Dean's standards. The wings were never hidden anymore and Dean couldn't imagine what a relief that must be for him. They did make Dean hope Cas never took up poker because those wings were the biggest tells he'd ever seen, practically every thought he had flitting across them. It must have been like someone who talked with their hands going around with them bound behind their back.

And Dean could tell by the way Cas was holding those wings up high and tight that he wasn't too happy about what he was seeing. "It's gonna be lacquered the same black to match, so make sure you're looking at it that way."

"I'm aware," he said and Dean wondered if he was just messing with him. Finally he sighed, blue eyes looking up at Dean as he crouched beside it. "It's better than I could have expected."

"People are usually a little happier when they say things like that."

Castiel's lips thinned for a moment as he traced his fingers along the trim on the legs. "The artifice was useful," he admitted.

Things had been a little uncertain since that first night, more than Dean had expected. He'd wondered if that had been a little too much, too soon but they'd both been too swept up for second thoughts. He guessed he could understand someone as walled off as Cas getting freaked but the frustration was starting to get to him. "You know you don't have to come up with excuses for me to come here anymore."

"You're misunderstanding my concern," Cas said, and Dean waited for him to elaborate but he stayed quiet.

Dean supposed expecting the cryptic as hell thing to go away overnight had been wishful thinking. "You should actually try it out," he said. "Make sure the height's right before I do anything else to it."

Cas pushed himself back to his feet and arranged himself on the bench, his wings slotting right into the indentations. "That is much better," he said, rolling his shoulders to adjust his wings a little more. He set his hands on the keyboard and paused, running his tongue over his lips. "Playing when I know someone is listening is more difficult than I expected," he admitted.

"Dude, trust me, I'm an entirely appreciative audience." Castiel shot him a skeptical look, like he thought Dean was patronizing him, but after a quick warm up he settled into something slow and a little sad to Dean's ears. "Who's this by?"

"Chopin."

Dean thought he knew who that was. He listened quietly for a few minutes, although focusing more on watching Castiel's hands on the keys than on the music. "Don't know why you're so hard on yourself. Being able to play like that is at least as impressive as me nailing some boards together."

"It's reflecting beauty, not creating it," he said with a little shake of his head. "Creation imprints a fragment of the artist's soul in the work and you can see it if you train yourself to look. I can learn all the music theory I like but I don't know how to do that."

"That's dumb. I've been to enough concerts to be able to tell when someone's putting their soul into that guitar solo."

"There you are. You can see it." His lips curled up. "And you shouldn't be so impressed, this composition sounds more complicated than it is. You could learn to play this passably well within a few months."

"Were you trying to impress me?" Cas glanced up at him before returning his focus to the keyboard, as if trying to shut Dean out entirely now and Dean grinned. He moved to stand behind Castiel and kissed the back of his neck, right where it joined with his back. He felt Castiel sigh and his grin widened; Dean slowly trailed his tongue up the back of Castiel's neck.

"Dean," he whispered, leaning back even as he kept playing.

"Culture's kind of lost on me sometimes," Dean said, sliding his hands through the slits cut in Cas' dress shirt to massage the bases of his wings. Cas missed a note but recovered, his breathing going ragged for a second. Cas had backed off before things went too far when they'd messed around that one time and Dean suspected that night had just moved too fast. He resolved going to make sure he took his sweet time now; he moved his way up each wing inch by very slow inch, massaging his fingertips into each tense muscle and not moving on until Cas was loose and relaxed. Every missed note was like a point on his mental scorecard; little moans kept catching on each of Castiel's breaths, very soft at first and then louder with each moment of excruciating attention Dean poured into him. Dean licked along the edge of Castiel's ear and felt him shiver; Dean could see his lips were parted and wet from where he'd licked his lips to try to hold onto his composure. He kept playing, even though he was missing almost as many chords as he made, a ratio that kept getting worse the longer Dean kept his hands on his wings. It was like an endurance test, Castiel's self-control against Dean's determination to see who would blink first.

A few minutes later Castiel slammed both hands on the keyboard as Dean found a spot up by the joint that made his whole body shake. The discordant chord faded until the only sound in the room was Castiel's ragged breathing. "Dean," he whispered again, sounding like he could barely gather enough breath to say even that.

"Turn around," Dean said, whispering right in Castiel's ear and Cas followed the direction, closing the lid over the keyboard as he moved to face Dean. Dean knelt over him, straddling across Cas' lap as he kissed him. Cas leaned back against the piano as Dean started to unbutton his shirt, taking as much time with that as he had with the wings, trailing his hands down each inch of exposed skin. Cas tilted his head back and Dean took the hint, licking up Castiel's throat and then kissing his way back down, feeling the vibration through his lips when Cas moaned. "You want me to back off just say the word, Cas."

"Don't you dare."

There could never be better music to Dean's ears. He trailed his hands down Castiel's chest, leaving the shirt loose and open as he worked his way down Castiel's body. He moved back from the bench and just took in Castiel draped across the piano, the black finish making the white of his wings pop, his chest rising and falling as he tried to catch his breath. Dean went down to his knees as he undid Cas' belt, sliding it out with the same deliberate slowness as when he'd started and keeping eye contact the whole time. Cas closed his eyes as Dean slipped his dress pants down over his hips and then off, taking an extra second to slide the silk of his boxer through his fingers before pulling those off too. Running his hands over Castiel's thighs felt like touching a living secret.

Dean kissed his inner thigh, finally wrapping one hand around Cas' shaft, drawing out another moan. "You ever do this before, Cas?"

"Long ago."

"Sounds like I have something to live up to."

Castiel smiled at that, and Dean so rarely saw him smile. "I've wanted you to do this from the moment you walked through my door."

Hearing that got Dean light-headed. He'd never done this before but nothing seemed to matter less than that now; he licked up Castiel's shaft and the _sound_ that dragged out of Cas brought Dean back to that dream he'd had so early on, Cas' hands clenching into his leather seats, Dean's name on his lips as he shook with climax. He'd never had that dream again but he'd almost managed to touch it a few times, faint impressions of rushed adrenaline and need, Cas' nails digging into his skin. Dean wanted to undo Castiel the way he'd been able to in that dream, make him sweat and shake until all he _could_ say was Dean's name. When Dean started sucking it was almost like he'd done it hundreds of times, the way Cas' head snapped back sinking into his bones. Cas started to writhe, urging Dean faster, his hands in Dean's hair, already so close it took less than a minute more for Dean to bring him over all the way. He looked right in Dean's eyes as he came and Dean felt something deep inside him shift. Cas sagged against the piano and Dean pushed himself up to kneel back over him, Cas' eyes thin circles of dark blue.

Dean felt like he'd been standing still his whole life waiting for this second. He wanted to tell Cas that but couldn't find the right words, instead just kissing him again long and slow and deep, hoping that would be enough for Castiel to feel him promise to make up for so much lost time.

888

"I didn't take your advice."

Sam leaned against the sofa; Dean had been calling him every hour on the hour while he was in class and Sam was just relieved it didn't sound like bad news. "I'm shocked."

"Shut up."

"Hey, you called me." He grinned down at Jess, who'd stopped even pretending to watch her show in favor of eavesdropping shamelessly. "I'm guessing this is more bragging than a disaster report, and that is _not_ me asking for the gory details."

"Feel like I've been standing still all this time, Sam. Don't know how to describe it."

"I'd say it's about time. You can only date so many Hooters waitresses before people start talking."

"I don't know why I called you in the first place."

"'Cause you wanted to brag."

"Got every right to."

Sam shook his head. "So when do I get to meet your mystery guy?"

"Come here and meet him yourself." He heard some noise in the background. "Easy, man, I'm coming back."

"Dean, we've talked about you calling in the _middle_ of your conquests."

"Not a conquest, Sam. This is serious. I don't think I've ever been this serious about anything. It's...I don't know. Kind of freaking me out a little."

Sam glanced down at Jess. "Yeah. It does that." There was more background murmuring and Dean said a hasty goodbye, leaving the undeniable understanding of what Dean was about to.

Sam stared at Dean's name blinking on his phone, not even realizing he was doing it until Jess nudged him. "Take it that was your brother?"

"Definitely was."

"And I take it you owe me ten bucks now?"

Sam pulled the money out of his pocket with an exaggerated sigh. "Still weird to think about Dean with a guy. I can't even count all the times I had to cover for him back after he'd snuck out with some girl when we were kids."

"The heart wants what it wants." She looped one arm through his. "He sounded happy, right?"

Sam shook his head. "I've never heard him sound that happy. It was _weird_."

"Then why don't you sound thrilled for him?"

Sam let out a breath. "I don't _know_. I mean, I'm happy for him, I am." He drummed his fingers against the sofa. "I feel like something bad's about to happen."

"You _always_ think something bad's about to happen," Jess said with a sigh. "What is it with you Winchesters? Why can't either of you just be happy?"

All Sam could do was shake his head again. "I wish I knew."


	5. Chapter 5

The thunder cracked loud enough to wake Dean out of sound sleep. A lifetime of living in Lawrence and Dean was still crap at predicting when these prairie storms would blow up; this one had come on so strong he knew there'd be no point trying to drive through it. He'd already stayed at Cas' later than he'd meant to and, well. Dean had a bad time saying no to spending the night in Cas' awesome bed on a quiet night, let alone one when the wind was howling murder outside.

He shifted over and saw that Castiel was awake too. Wide awake, making Dean think he'd been that way for a while, staring up at the ceiling like he'd been trying to stay quiet to let Dean sleep. "Hey," Dean said, nudging him; the look in Cas' eyes when he looked at Dean scared the crap out of him. "What's up? You have a nightmare?"

Cas nodded once. "Something like that."

Dean moved on top of him, kissing him until he felt Cas relax beneath. "Just a dream, okay? Or whatever." Cas slid his hands up Dean's back, happy to let Dean start working him over. "Kinda nuts how quick this all went down, huh? Less than two weeks is fast even for me."

"I did try to keep you at arm's length."

"Yeah, not that hard, though." He stroked his hands down Cas' wing to take the sting out of the teasing. He settled next to Cas, wrapping one arm around him; he still felt tense and antsy and Dean wondered how long it would take to tease out what was going on. "Lucky I'm the name you pulled out of the phone book that day, huh?"

Castiel was quiet long enough Dean almost fell back asleep. "I wasn't sure it was really you," Cas said, so softly it was almost like he was talking to the air instead of to Dean. "When I first saw your name." Cas' eyes were wide but his voice was calm, like this had been rehearsed. "I thought perhaps you would be a mechanic. You were always so fond of your car."

"My dad was but I converted the shop when he passed. I don't like working on new cars and there's no money in the old ones, not enough. Taught myself carpentry. What are you talking about?"

"I started with the cars because they reminded me of you. Obviously I never found the right Impala." There was a look of resigned acceptance on Castiel's face. "Do you know any ghost stories, Dean?"

"What stories?"

"Ghosts. Evil spirits. Old fables about monsters stalking in the dark."

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

"You used to." When he glanced over the look in his eyes pinned Dean to the bed. "I'm going to tell you something you won't accept easily. That doesn't mean it's not true."

Dean had the sudden, instinctive urge to run from that house and never look behind him. "Go ahead."

"This is the third version of this world. Of this reality, of everything. God Himself rewrote the world like a flawed manuscript and believes He's finally perfected it." He swallowed hard. "The first time it was through a flood. Not a _real_ flood, the true word is closer to wave, a force that destroyed everything but His new starting point. Did you ever wonder why so many cultures have myths about flood?" Dean nodded although he'd never really given it much thought. "That's a scar, like the impression left after you erase a pencil mark."

"Cas, what are you _getting_ at?"

"There used to be monsters in the world. Demons. Werewolves, ghosts., ravenous plagues that stole your face with a smile with as they killed you. Tomes and tomes of lore and legend." He pushed himself to his knees. "And you fought them. You and Sam, among others. You've been fighting them since you were a very small child."

"Yeah, but...I haven't. My life is really kind of boring."

"But you did once. Do you ever dream about fire?" Dean felt ice seep into his bones. "That's a scar, too. What you do marks your soul and not even God can erase every last impression."

"Okay. Keep going."

"My Father was a terrible landlord. And like the first time He looked down at this world He'd created and thought, 'Well, enough of that.' Do you know the story of how Lucifer turned against the Heavenly Host and rebelled, populating Hell with demons?"

"Sure, I guess so. The Lucifer part, anyway."

"And of course you've heard there are demons who escape and possess humans, performing evil on Earth."

"I have no idea what a demon is, Cas."

"That's because there aren't any and never have been. Lucifer sits in his prison alone. Eve never created her monsters and spirits don't linger no matter how unfinished the business. Everything's much more efficient now, I suppose."

"You said your _father_, Cas."

"I did."

Dean had a gut feeling he hadn't meant that in the "we're all the children of God" sense. "What the hell are you?"

Castiel gave Dean that level stare of his for a very long time. "I'm an angel of the Lord," he finally said. "Can you at least believe that?"

Dean felt something in those words echo through him. For an instant Dean was in another room, another building, drafty with a storm raging and shadows of wings on the walls. "Yeah," he whispered, that impression disappearing in the time it took him to blink. "Yeah, I can."

Cas let out a shaky breath. "The first time I said that to you, you stabbed me in the chest. This is going much better." He pulled on a dressing gown, one hand on Dean's shoulder. "Come with me."

Dean pulled on his jeans and followed Cas through a winding side corridor; he'd had the run of the house for a while now but didn't think he'd managed to explore half the rooms yet. The lights came on as Castiel walked into the room (without him touching anything, Dean noticed. He'd never seen so much as light switch in the place and realized now he'd just never bothered to ask) revealing an assortment of paintings hanging on the walls and a sword rack against the far wall.

"How many art galleries do you have, Cas?"

"A few." He let out a deep sigh. "I was dead when the world reset," Cas said, as casually as if that was something people said every day. "Don't look so horrified, Dean, I died plenty of times. I was almost getting used to it." He shook his head, his eyes turning sad and inward. "So many of us had died. I woke up surrounded by brothers and sisters I'd thought long lost, many of them very angry at me. Then we were in the presence of the Almighty," he said, sounding remarkably unimpressed for an angel talking about chatting with God.

"Sounds like that should be a bigger deal."

"It was later than I would have liked," Cas said. "I wasn't the only one with that opinion but it wasn't an open forum. We were told there would be another reset and this time we would be part of it. The dead would live again, all the slates wiped clean. Almost as new as the day we were formed." A cold fury crept into his voice. "I was being killed again and my Father called it a kindness."

"I'm guessing telling God you weren't thrilled with that idea wouldn't have flown."

"Most of my siblings _were_ happy with the idea. We'd have guidance again. Orders," he said, and even though he said the word with disgust Dean could hear some longing there, too. "Unfortunately _someone_," he said, looking right at Dean, "taught me about free will. I couldn't let that go to be...to be _controlled_," he said, horror in his voice Dean didn't understand. "So I ran."

"How do you hide from God, Cas?"

"God, I'm not sure but I'm not the first to hide from Heaven." He nodded to a Renaissance painting of the Visitation. "One of my older brothers had a...'scam' is probably the right word. I couldn't do what he did, there are less monsters in the world to blend with but I thought I could lose myself with the humans well enough. Taking a vessel would lead them all right to me so I did what he had and created a physical form. I wish I'd asked him how much that would hurt," he said, almost as an aside.

"So that's the deal with the wings, then? Angels really do have those?"

"Well, yes. And no, not like these. I'm not as powerful as him so I couldn't make my body as perfect," he said, stretching out his wings with a rueful look. "But it's serviceable. And it let me hide." He walked over over to the sword rack. "I had been a soldier for most of my existence. Not even a particularly noteworthy one, until certain things happened," he said, giving Dean another loaded look. "I threw myself back to the earliest recorded history and tried to lose myself," he said, pointing to the antique swords displayed. "And it worked for a very long time."

"All of these are yours, then?" Dean said, moving up from what looked like a Roman sword at the bottom to a silver short sword with a rounded pommel sitting at the top. Dean's mind was having a hard time grabbing onto the kind of time span Cas was talking about and latching onto little details like _Shit, that's a lot of swords_ helped. Then Dean looked around the room and raised an eyebrow. "I'm guessing that changed."

"It felt meaningless after a time. Freedom didn't mean very much if it didn't come with a purpose, at least not to me. I'd even thought about returning to Heaven. I thought I'd made a mistake and it certainly wouldn't be the first time for that." He let out a long sigh. "I was in Austria and heard Mozart play. He was still a child, playing with his sister and of course I knew who he would be and..." He crossed his arms, shaking his head like he couldn't find the right words. "Not all angels are soldiers. Some are guardians, cherubim are matchmakers, and then there are some that inspire the arts. I'd never understood the appeal of that," he admitted, "but then I'd envied them. We can't create, we don't have souls to do that with but I thought maybe I could find a purpose there anyway. I could preserve. Reflect. It was bracing, being around people who created instead of destroyed."

"That's a long ass way from Kansas."

That got something very close to a smile out of Castiel. "I needed constant glamors to keep from being detected," he said with a quick glance _up_. "That was draining after so long and I wanted to stay in one place. This seemed as good a place as any," he said with a little shrug. "I took the power I used to hide myself and used it for...something else," he said, looking around the room with clear pride on his face.

"You made all this out of thin air?"

"Out of Grace transmuted into a static physical form, yes."

"See? You can make stuff."

"If you mean copy a design I saw once in Denmark with less battlements, then yes." He shook his head. "I didn't even know Lawrence was going to grow on my doorstep, or not consciously, anyway. I'm hidden here. That's why I had to ask you not to use my name to anyone outside."

"Why the fuck would you take that kind of risk? Why even talk to me?"

Castiel was quiet for a long time. "Dean, why do you think I went so far back into the past?"

"'Cause you needed to throw them off."

"Because I'd hoped that over a thousand years would be enough to forget I ever laid eyes on you," he said, frustration boiling in his voice like this was all Dean's fault somehow. "And then I saw you and it felt like it hadn't even been a day."

Dean leaned against the wall watching as agitation fluffed his wings up. "The day after that first consultation I had a dream," he said. "You and me at a road stop in the back of my car." Cas began making a very careful study of the floor. "That really happened, didn't it. Before God decided to call this cosmic do-over."

"So that's how," Cas said softly. He nodded. "I...we were doing something very dangerous in the morning and I think you wanted to take my mind off of things. You took me to a brothel first and that didn't go particularly well," he said, a faint smile on his face. "You were determined that _someone_ would deflower me before the end of the night."

Okay, alternate universe or not that did sound like him. "You're welcome."

"I was so curious," he said, his voice soft again. "When I saw your name. But I didn't want to disrupt your life, either. Whether or not I agree with what God's done you deserve your second chance and I thought if there were boundaries, a clear beginning and end then..." Castiel shrugged. "But we see how that worked out." He crossed his arms. "I didn't behave very well," he said. "I wasn't thinking clearly."

"Why have me make you that bench? I mean, I get that you wanted the excuse, but you could have used anything."

"I did need it," he said. "And as I told you, when you create something it gains a sliver of the artist's soul. I...I thought if perhaps I could have just that, it would be enough..."

Dean walked forward and kissed him before he could say another word. "You don't have to be all by yourself in this place if you don't want to be. You hear me?"

Castiel nodded, clinging to Dean. "The storm's over," he said, placing a light, lingering kiss on Dean's lips.

"You trying to get rid of me?"

"I gave you a lot to think about," he said, fingertips against Dean's temple. "And yes."

888

Dean's eyes drifted open, individual sensations slowly registering one by one. Sheets tangled around his legs. Wind rattling the windows, the last of the storm blowing itself out. He didn't remember falling asleep and didn't feel all that awake now, everything registering as hazy and unfocused.

"That's because you're not. Awake, I mean."

Dean pushed himself to his elbows and looked over his shoulder, grinning when he saw Castiel standing against the wall silhouetted in the dim light. "The hell did you do?"

Castiel shrugged. "Sent you home. I wanted to avoid an argument."

Dean rolled over and rubbed his forehead. "This feels weird."

"It's been a long time since I've done this," Cas said, almost sounding embarrassed. "Entering dreams used to be much more seamless."

Something about that woke a subtle ache in Dean. Almost like a tinge of deja vu for something he hadn't known to miss. "Guess you used to barge into my head all the time, huh?"

"Not...precisely like this." Lightning flashed like an effect in an old Hammer movie, flooding the room with an instant of light. Castiel flared his wings open and Dean saw he was naked, the play of light and shadow making him look pale and otherworldly. Which Dean guessed was about right.

"I'm liking this dream already," Dean said, sitting up now. Castiel crossed his arms, looking both faintly nervous and immensely pleased with himself. "C'mere."

Castiel knelt on the edge of the bed, leaning forward as Dean lay back. "This seems different. Now that you know."

It did feel different. It felt fucking _overwhelming_. Dean looked past Castiel to the shadows of his wings, deep and black against his wall and felt something in his head slot into place. "You know how sometimes you have those dreams that disappear right when you wake up, and then you're walking around trying to remember the rest of the day."

"...no?"

"Right, angel, 'course you don't." Dean reached up to brush his fingertips against the edge of Cas' wings, then nodded over Cas' shoulder to the shadows. "Think I've been having those dreams about your wings looking like that for as long as I can remember."

He felt Castiel shiver, although whether from the words or the touch Dean couldn't tell. "I don't understand," Cas said, with a soft, frustrated breath. "I don't understand why you would remember anything. You shouldn't."

Dean gently pulled Castiel forward into a kiss, coaxing his lips open until he felt Castiel give up worrying over that mystery to press against Dean. He felt Castiel straddle across his legs, one hand reaching under his shirt to trace down his stomach. "We never have enough time," he whispered, fingertips finding every sensitive spot on Dean's skin.

"We got all the time in the world, Cas."

Castiel's smile was so faint Dean almost missed it. "I want to take my time with you tonight," he said, his hand stroking up the length of Dean's thigh now.

Dean didn't need any help at all reading between those lines. He'd had more than his share of fun turning Castiel into a gasping mess lately and had no trouble returning the favor. He lay back, propping one arm under his head. "You can do anything you want, Cas. You know that."

Castiel looked at him then and for an instant Dean didn't know how he could have ever mistaken him for human. The power and age all reached out and wrapped around Dean, pressing him against the bed like a weight. "I can feel your soul," Castiel whispered, the wonder in his eyes an echo of what Dean was trying so hard to breathe against now. "No barrier. I'd forgotten what that was like." He eased off Dean's shorts and Dean took that as his cue to tug off his shirt and toss it to the floor. The way Cas' eyes lit up in appreciation tempted Dean to never wear clothes again.

Castiel knelt between Dean's legs and started to trace his fingertips down Dean's body, long, slow strokes like he was trying to commit every curve and crease and imperfection to memory, right down to the lines on his palms. Dean closed his eyes and stretched out; the way Cas was touching him made it impossible to keep a thought in his head, all of his attention pulled toward how Castiel was making his skin practically hum. He'd had massages that hadn't relaxed him like this, letting himself go loose and limp as Cas kept working him over.

When he finally felt Cas' lips against the hollow of his throat Dean couldn't swallow back the moan. He felt his fingers clenching into the sheets and decided to play a game with himself, see how long he could fight back the need to have his hands on Castiel. Dean was hyper aware of every reaction his body had, something he could only chalk up to this being part of a dream; his back arched as Castiel started to kiss his way up Dean's neck, his hips rising just enough for his erection to brush against Cas' skin. The breathy sound Cas let out at that just sent more blood to Dean's already almost uncomfortable hard on; Dean decided that didn't quite count as cheating and started rocking his hips, each brush against Cas' skin making it that much harder for Dean to breathe.

Castiel wouldn't be rushed, though. Dean felt Cas' tongue trace along the edge of his lower lip and leaned his head back, feeling a shiver run through him as Cas settled into a slow, wet kiss, his whole body finally pressing against Dean. The skin contact hit Dean like a lightning strike; Cas held his head still, deepening the kiss as Dean started to grind against him and Dean decided to cheat a little more and grabbed a handful of Cas' hair, earning himself a surprised moan. By the time Cas pulled back Dean was light-headed; he opened his eyes and the sight of Castiel leaning over him that way, flushed and eyes wide and lips parted, that was almost enough to make Dean come right there. Castiel took a moment to compose himself and it took every ounce of Dean's self-control to not grab him and pin him down to the mattress.

But if Cas wanted slow, Dean could do slow. Castiel went back to his slow survey of Dean's body, this time with his lips and tongue and teeth instead of his fingers. Dean clenched his hands into the sheets, barely able to pull air into his lungs as Cas sucked on his collarbone and kissed his way down his chest. Each brush of Cas' wings against his skin felt like tiny electric shocks; Dean finally started to writhe when he felt Cas' lips against his stomach. Castiel seemed to pick up on that and slowed down even more, sucking his way all the way down a path to the line of Dean's hip.

All this and he hadn't so much as _touched_ Dean's cock. When he finally felt Cas' fingers wrap around his shaft Dean's vision whited out for a second. Dean realized he was murmuring _Cas, Cas, Cas_ over and over and didn't know when that had started; the feel of precome dripping onto his stomach was maddening and the frustration was not at all helped by Cas licking up the underside of his shaft. "Cas, man," Dean gasped, trying to remember how words worked, "I know you wanna...wanna take your time but can you speed it up just a little."

Dean could swear Cas chuckled at him. The shameless pleading worked, though; a second later Dean felt Castiel slide one finger inside him. Dean's head snapped back, his eyes squeezing shut as he tried to control his breathing. "Dean," Cas whispered, sounding out of breath himself. "Dean, look at me."

Dean forced his eyes open. The sheen of sweat on Cas' skin made him all but glow in the dim light, his wings curled around him like a frame. He leaned down and kissed Dean again, a light touch this time, then he arranged himself more comfortably between Dean's legs, his hand warm on Dean's thigh. Dean didn't question the need for more prep, giving that over to dream logic, and anyway he didn't think he'd ever felt this ready for anything. Cas held the eye contact as he pressed in that first inch and the room wasn't too dark for Dean to see how that made Cas' eyes dilate to blue-ringed black. His hands were shaking when he braced himself against Dean's shoulders and Dean decided he'd been good long enough, tracing his hands up Cas' legs, rocking his hips to let Cas know to keep going. Even now Cas took his time, easing himself in inch by inch and Dean's patience was starting to fray; he dug his nails into Cas' hips until Cas finally moaned and pushed himself all the way in.

Dean groaned with relief but it didn't last long; as Cas started to move Dean grabbed two big handfuls of Cas' wings, feeling like he needed to hold on for dear life. The way that made Cas whimper just added to that pressure building in his groin. Castiel settled into a rhythm and Dean could feel himself already edging toward climax; he fumbled Cas' hand back toward his cock and that combined with feeling Cas moving inside him short circuited something in his brain. Cas had found a perfect spot and every time he hit it Dean saw flashes of light behind his eyes; Dean knew he was talking but didn't know what he was saying. Even the feeling of the sheets against his skin was overwhelming now; he was so close to climax Dean thought he might be begging for it. He heard Cas' voice but couldn't make out the words, just the rasp of it enough to make Dean moan.

He opened his eyes, whispering Cas' name as he felt Castiel trace one thumb along his lower lip. Then Cas moved one more time and Dean felt his climax rush through him. Dean let the sensation overwhelm him; he felt Castiel shake above him with one last moan and then curl up beside him, one wing draped across Dean's chest.

After a few seconds Dean got himself together and wrapped one arm around Cas to drape him on top him, the way Cas was shaking going a long way towards getting Dean hard again. He tipped Cas' chin up and kissed him, sucking on his lip until Castiel gathered himself enough to kiss back. "That was fucking _awesome_, Cas."

Castiel smiled at that, unmistakable pride flushing his skin. "I have waited _several_ lifetimes to do that."

"Come on, don't tell me that's the first time we did it that way."

"That thoroughly, at any rate."

Dean eased himself to almost sitting, shifting Castiel so he was draped across his chest because fuck it, that felt amazing. "Yeah, guess I can almost see that," he said, smoothing a few stray feathers back into place and grinning when Cas shivered from it. "No reason we couldn't have done this back at your place, though."

Castiel shook his head. "I didn't want you to get caught in the crossfire."

Dean blinked for a second, trying to figure out if he'd heard that right. "Caught in...I'm not following."

Castiel leaned up on his elbows, kissing Dean without raising his eyes to look at him. "Don't go back to the house. Forget it's there. Forget it was ever there."

It hit Dean all at once that Castiel was shaky when the rush should have long since past. "Cas, what's going _on_?"

"The inevitable." He kissed Dean hard, one had clenched tight in his hair. "I love you," he whispered. "It's the only truth in my life that's ever held." He stared into Dean's eyes for a moment so long Dean felt the time begin to stretch.

Castiel leaned down, his lips by Dean's ear. "I was _not lost_ when I touched you, Dean," he whispered. "Always remember that."

Dean opened his eyes, the room dark and empty and the sheets soaked. He pushed himself up to sit on the edge of the bed, his head swimming; he could _feel_ the adrenaline shooting through his veins, solidifying in a hard knot of dread and fear and _rage_ right in the center of his chest.

It felt like waking up from a dream in more than just the literal. Dean waited for the head rush to fade, his heart pounding like a war drum and slowly realized that each second that passed only kicked the adrenaline up higher. He wondered if this was how he'd once felt all the time, before some higher power saw fit to overwrite his life.

Dean threw on some clothes and grabbed his keys. He had to see. And even though Cas had warned him to stay away, Dean didn't think for a second Cas had actually expected him to listen.


	6. Chapter 6

The Impala roared down the highway, tires squealing as Dean took the sharp turn onto the access road leading to the mansion, whispering an apology to his baby as he pressed the gas pedal back down to the floor. The scars from that previous life were screaming in his head, like black shadows he could touch and see through. Dean realized a part of him knew what he was going to find but seeing the heavy gate uprooted and twisted into knots dropped his heart into his stomach. The garage had some minor damage, mostly from another piece of the gate being chucked through it like a javelin. Dean guessed there had to be a little mojo on that place too but he guessed not enough to attract attention.

The house, though. The house was a different story. Something had ripped the east wing roof back like a can opener and the whole area was littered with broken glass. When Dean got to the front door he found it hanging on by one hinge, the entire top half ripped away. He followed the trail of destruction through the house; glowing on the walls were sigils and complicated patterns Dean had never seen before. He wondered if Cas had just done these out of last ditch desperation but there were too many. Maybe when they broke the magic weaved into the place those had been tripped, like a second line of defense. Whatever they were, Dean got the feeling they hadn't worked.

He knew it would be the piano room. Anything that had hunted Cas for this long and made this much of a mess gunning for him would want to make him hurt, and that room had something Cas loved. Where the thing Dean had made for him was – hell, if Cas was right about the soul thing, for all Dean knew they could smell his soul on it. _Sons of bitches. I'm going to kill each and every one of you._

The thought caught Dean off guard. Not that he wanted to kill these angels but that he was absolutely sure he _could_. Cas had said he and Sam had hunted monsters. Maybe some of that was still lurking around in his blood after all.

Dean had gone in knowing the piano room would be a wreck but actually stepping into the room Dean had to fight the urge to throw up. The piano was cracked in half, and if Dean were going to bet on it he'd say that was because Cas had been thrown into it. The bench was destroyed too, one of the legs ripped off and smeared with blood; there was another blood stain on the floor, a long one like Cas had been dragged. Dean saw a metallic glint in the corner and found that silver short sword that had been sitting in the place of honor on top of Cas' sword rack just a few hours before. There was blood smeared on the blade and Dean was glad Cas had gotten in at least one good shot.

The lurching realization that this had happened before, angels coming for Cas' skin and him getting there too late wrapped around his chest until he started to choke; he blinked his eyes and he was in a warehouse instead of the music room, the same incomprehensible sigils painted on the walls. He blinked again and he was in a living room, blood and gore painted all over the walls.

Dean crouched down until the queasy deja vu passed and he thought he could stand again without throwing up all over what was left of Cas' hardwood floors. He forced himself to remember what was important here – he hadn't found _Cas_. Dean knew if they'd killed him they would have left the body here even though he had no idea why he was sure about that. That meant Dean could find him.

Dean remembered his father telling them about their grandfather serving in WWII because John Winchester was full of war stories, his own and everyone else's, and how one of the Japanese generals had been against the attack on Pearl Harbor because it would wake up the sleeping dragon.

He was going to make damn sure these angels would wish they'd let him stay asleep.

888

Dean sat in the car until his hands stopped shaking enough for him to hold his phone, then he punched in Sam's number, still so dazed he forgot he could just use the speed dial. "Yeah?" Sam said, sounding bleary as hell; Dean looked at the sky and saw it wasn't quite dawn, which meant Sam was still squarely in the middle of the night. "Dean? Why're you calling?"

Dean realized he had absolutely no idea where he was even supposed to start with this. "The other angels found Cas and grabbed him," he finally said, letting the words spill out because hell, it was true. Nuts, but true. "We gotta find him."

Sam was quiet for a long time, enough that Dean began to assume that he was looking up how to have Dean committed from California. "Why does that make sense?"

"I know, right?" Dean slumped back in the driver's seat. "I don't know what to do," he said, suspecting another version of him _would_ have known. "I don't know where to start looking, anything. I need you here, Sam." Dean didn't even know what Sam was supposed to do, he knew even less than Dean but if he was going to war he wanted Sam by his side. He wondered how many times he and Sam had done things like this, that lifetime ago.

"I'm there. I'll be on the next flight, don't do anything stupid until I get there. I'll call you when I'm boarding."

Dean nodded, still so out of it he forgot Sam couldn't see him. "I'll pay you back."

"Dude, forget it." Sam almost laughed for a second. "Y'know, it's weird. The first time you called me about this it's like I knew something was going to happen."

"We are the luckiest sons of bitches out there. I'll fill you in when you get here, this shit is way too nuts to go into over the phone." He switched the phone to his other year. "You were right, by the way."

"About what?"

"There is a God. He's just a huge dick."

That made Sam laugh but Dean meant every word of it. He hoped the son of a bitch was listening in.

888

The ride out to Kansas City to pick up Sam at the airport was a traffic nightmare and the ride back even worse. Dean started filling Sam in the second he settled into the passenger seat, finding that the more he talked through the story Cas had told him the the more sense it seemed to make. Details were starting to come back in a hazy way, like a movie he'd seen when he was too young to remember but stayed rattling around in his subconscious anyway. The difference being of course that this wasn't a movie they were talking about, this was his _fucking life_. From the hints Cas had dropped Dean got the feeling that previous life of his hadn't been the greatest but that didn't matter. He understood completely why Cas would run for the hills because he would have done the same same damn thing – maybe it hadn't been much of a life but it had been _his_ and no one had the right to screw with that, not even if that someone did happen to be God.

"I had a dream Jess died in a fire," Sam said. "Like, the whole week of Halloween senior year, every night she died in a fire, the same way you used to dream about his mom. I guess that really happened then, huh?"

That broke Dean out of the rage spiral. He guessed maybe God hadn't completely screwed up on everything. "I don't know, Sam."

"Yeah, I think you kinda do." He drummed his fingers against the passenger seat window. "So is this what we're really doing? Going up against Angels and God."

"They started it." Dean shook his head. "How freaked out are you right now?"

"Not as much I would have thought, actually. It's weird."

"I hear you. I don't know what we were like in that other universe but we must have been serious bad asses."

Sam nodded off a few minutes later and when Dean checked the time he almost drove right into the hatchback going five miles under the speed limit up ahead. "Hey," he said, trying to poke Sam back awake. "Keep an eye for signs." Sam grumbled and tried to curl up on the seat the way he had when he was five years old. "Dude, that worked a lot better when your legs weren't a thousand miles long." He shook his head; he had pulled Sam out of bed, Dean supposed he should let him sleep while he could. He focused back on the road; they'd just blown past the marker saying they were four miles from the next exit and Dean didn't want to miss it.

Five minutes later they passed the four mile marker again. The third time the car looped around the straight stretch of road Dean felt a bead of sweat roll down his back. For the first time he noticed there were no other cars on the highway, coming or going. The clock was stuck at the time Sam had fallen asleep, and when he tapped the display the time actually ticked backward. He took a deep breath and wrapped his hands around the steering wheel. He could do this. Hell, from what Cas said he and Sam used to do stuff like this all the time. "Whatever you are, you got something to say then speak your piece."

"What are you doing, Dean?"

The voice came from the backseat; Dean glanced up at the rearview mirror and saw a guy perched on the edge of the seat, his fingers steepled under his chin. Perfectly normal looking guy, Dean guessed around his age, curly hair and a beard and the kind of wide eyes and Dean guessed probably made him look worried all the time. Nothing special about him.

Dean's heart was pounding so hard he thought for a second it was going to burst bloody out of his chest. "Who are you supposed to be?"

The guy shook his head. "No one. Just some writer."

The four mile marker passed again. "I'm guessing you know exactly what I'm doing."

Another head shake. "You can't do this, Dean. This isn't how the story's supposed to go."

"I don't give a shit about a story. Cas is in trouble, I'm gonna get him out of it."

"How do you intend to do that?"

Good damn question. "I'll figure it out."

"You won't find him. He's not somewhere you _can_ find." Dean felt that cold knot pull tighter. "You've got a good life, Dean, the one you were supposed to have. Get married, have a couple of kids. Name one of them after your dad, you've always wanted to do that. Sam can take the bar, have kids of his own. If anyone deserves a happy ending it's you two. You're good soldiers but your war is over."

Dean drummed his fingers against the steering wheel. He heard the words but all he could see was that blood stain smeared into Castiel's floor. "They gonna hurt him?" he asked, already knowing the answer.

He wasn't at all surprised when the man nodded. "Yes."

Dean squeezed the wheel. "_Why_? Cas, he...he just wants to be left alone. He doesn't want anything to do with this."

The eyes in the mirror turned sad. "They think they're doing him a kindness. Bringing the family back together. Kind of a...brotherly intervention, I guess you could say."

Dean wondered if they'd break his hands. They'd wrecked the piano, no reason not to go the whole nine and break those too, make it so he could never play again. He brushed one hand against his shirt pocket; he'd found a torn out feather in the wreckage and had pocketed it barely even realizing it. They could cut off those wings. He could make Castiel a shivering wreck just by touching them the right way, they were so sensitive; Dean had the sick visual of someone wrenching those wings back and taking a blade to them and telling Cas they were doing it to help him. "Oh yeah, I'm betting they're just full of brotherly love. You really got the whole bunch of them to drink the Kool-Aid, huh?"

"Why do you think _I_ did that?"

"Because you're the one telling the fucking story."

An acknowledging nod. "Most but not all," he admitted. "Castiel wasn't the only hold out, just the most...flamboyantly rebellious about it, although I guess I shouldn't be _that_ surprised..."

"Shut up." Dean waited for a lightning strike but nothing happened. "Stop talking about him like you care."

"I've always cared, Dean."

"Got a funny way of showing it."

"I'm here _because_ I care. I won't stand in your way but if you keep down this path you won't ever see Heaven."

"Until a couple days ago I didn't even really believe in Heaven," he muttered. "So what would happen? Big dirt nap, that's it? Hell? Cas made it sound pretty empty but you'd be willing to make an exception?"

"Does it really matter?"

Dean thought about the shadow of Castiel's wings on his bedroom wall as Cas knelt over him. "Cas told me he'd been dead when you decided to hit rewind. He's all alone now, did it go the same way then? Or how about any of the other times he said he'd kicked off? How'd they go?"

"There's a famous quote about how everyone dies alone."

"That doesn't mean they should have to." The 4 mile marker passed by again. "Have I done this before? It feels...I don't know. Feels like I've done this before."

Dean heard a sigh from the back seat. "The point of this was to keep you from reliving those old patterns."

"Cas told me something in a dream last night. I mean, I wasn't dreaming about him, he showed up in the dream..."

"I understand the distinction."

"Bet you do." He squeezed the steering wheel until his knuckles turned white. "Cas said something to me and I didn't say it back. Had time to and I didn't and I don't know why. When we knew each other before, did I ever say it then?" Not that Dean couldn't guess at the answer.. He just needed to hear it confirmed.

"Not...as such, no."

In a way that made everything much easier. "You said I've got the life I'm supposed to have but I've never felt that way. Been looking over my shoulder for something the whole time. Waiting for that shoe to drop. Me and Sam, we've always had our wagons circled and now that makes sense but it was something else with me. Screwed up every relationship I've ever been in because I've always been looking for something else. Felt that way until I walked into that mansion and met that weirdo." Dean shook his head. "You can keep Heaven. Cas has been running like hell from there for about a thousand years now, so I doubt I'm missing much." He nodded over to Sam. "You leave my brother out of this, though. I'm doing something stupid, fine, he doesn't suffer for it."

The man nodded. "Your choices are your own, just like his. That's how free will works."

"Cool. Something I've been wondering, since we've gotten so friendly." The man's brows drew together but Dean got the feeling that was an act, he knew exactly what Dean was about to say. "Cas said he built his house on that site and didn't know he'd have Lawrence in his backyard. Is there any chance that's true?"

"I don't know what you're implying."

"I had a dream," Dean said, rage making the words sharp. "A dream about a life that never happened. That a coincidence too?" Silence from the back seat. "When I told him about it Cas said _So that's how._ Is that what blew his cover?"

"It does seem likely."

"Why the fuck would you do that?"

"You ever do any writing, Dean?" Dean shook his head. "There's a philosophy that says you should 'kill your darlings.' It means that sometimes the ideas you like the best, those little turns of phrase you're so impressed with, they're the ones that make the story not work. No matter how much it hurts you're supposed to rip them right out of the text and never look back."

"The hell does that have to do with anything?"

Dean couldn't read the man's expression, the same kind of enigmatic smile he saw on Cas' face sometimes, right down to the same sad eyes. "Some darlings are harder to kill than others." He nodded up to the mile marker lapping them again. "Take the next exit. When you find Main Street just drive until you can't, then turn right at the light and then make a left. It's the fourth house down." His brows furrowed again, the smile fading. "Tell him he can have what he wants."

When Dean glanced back up at the mirror the back seat was empty. He floored the gas, jumping the car enough to wake Sam. "What happened? I miss something?"

Dean shook his head, an almost manic hope grabbing him by the throat. "Got a lead. Strap in, I think we're about to pick up some cavalry."


	7. Chapter 7

Dean pulled up to a spiffy house in one of those neighborhoods rich enough that he was worried he might get reported to the police for not having enough labels on his clothes. The name on the mailbox had "Dr." in front of it and Dean guessed that if they could use anything right now, it would be one of those.

He didn't even get to knock on the door before it opened; standing in the doorway was a youngish man, Dean guessed around his own age, slim and dark-skinned with close-cropped hair. He leaned against the door jamb with his arms crossed over his chest, an unabashedly delighted smile on his face. "Dean Winchester," he said in a surprisingly strong baritone. "I knew this day would come."

"You know me?"

"There was a time we knew each other very well. I assume my runaway brother's been discovered at last."

Well, that answered at least one of the questions Dean was choking down right now. "Why do you think that?"

"You coming to me? That could only mean this is about Castiel. Who sent you here?"

Dean shrugged. "Didn't give me a name. Gave me directions right to your door, though." He tried to remember the exact wording. "Said 'Tell him he can have what he wants.' That make any sense to you?"

Dean saw the man's expression shift from a kind of amused indifference to suddenly very, very interested. "Did He, now?"

"Exact words." He knew he should be cautious but he knew that without this guy they had nothing. "The other angels took him, and took him hard. Our, um..._mutual friend_ made it sound like you could help."

"Indeed I can. In fact, I believe I know were they may have taken him, and I don't believe it's in Heaven. Not yet."

Dean had been trying to beat back the hope flaring in his chest the entire drive here, telling himself not to count his chickens and any other dumbass phrase he could think of to keep from getting ahead of himself. He let himself feel that hope now. "So you'll help?"

"I will guide you there myself."

Dean narrowed his eyes. "_Why_?"

"As you can see," he said, gesturing around him, "I didn't think very much of our father's plan either. I just didn't have my brothers and sisters trying to beat down my door afterward."

"Why not?"

"Rank has its privileges. But we should go before any of our other siblings decide to get creative with the _persuasions_."

Dean wished he had time to second guess. He had the feeling that when torture had that kind of PR it only meant it was twice as bad as the honest kind. "Cool. Cool, thanks Doctor..."

"Oh, no," he said, waving that off. "That's my mortal name, I've had hundreds of those. People who go back as far as we do should at least be on a first name basis." He put one hand on Dean's shoulder. "Call me Raphael instead."

888

The drive was weird. Sam got kicked to the backseat as their new guide began to give directions, pointing out turns and making suggestions but virtually mute otherwise. "You and Cas must have been close, huh?"

"I think we knew each other better than any other beings. I wouldn't go so far as to say it was the closest or friendliest relationship in the garrison but it created a bond. One that's obviously held, or you wouldn't have come to my door."

"If you guys aren't really friends why are you doing this? They'll just come after you next."

Raphael smiled. "I highly doubt it."

"'Cause of your rank?"

"That is one of the privileges I'd mentioned before."

"You angels are so fucking weird. Cas had his castle he never leaves and now here you are slumming it as a doctor."

"If you actually read your Bible you would know that I was renowned as a healer. We all need a purpose in this world."

_Touchy._ "What're we going to do when we get there?"

"Leave the angels to me."

Well. That didn't sound like a threat at all. "What did he promise you, anyway?"

Raphael leaned back in the seat. "He gave me the only thing I could ever want." He looked right at Dean. "He promised to finally let me die."

888

It took about twenty miles before Dean could figure out how to respond. "Why the hell would you want that?"

Raphael was quiet for a few moments, seemingly engrossed in watching the apparently endless number of cows grazing in the fields they drove past. "How old were you when you first realized your father was flawed?"

"I..." He hadn't expected Raphael to pick such a sore point on his first try. "When I was little he and my mom used to have these big fights where he'd storm out and she'd start crying. Used to always try to make her feel better. I don't know."

"That sounds very painful. Parents are the household gods of all children. Stronger, larger, the source of all life. Did you ever think of it that way? The moment where the son is tall enough to look at his father in the eye as an equal must feel like a death."

Dean shrugged, not sure where he was going with this. "I mean, I didn't curl up and die from it or anything. It happens. Parents are people, weird as that is to get your head around sometimes."

"Now imagine that your father was in fact supposed to _be_ infallible. That everything you were sang that to you at night, that it was weaved into every aspect of your being. Perfection. The source of all light and darkness and everything in between." He paused for a moment, partially to give that time to sink in and, Dean strongly suspected, for a good dose of dramatic effect. "Now imagine that one day this perfect being looks at everything he's created and decides - 'Huh. I'll do better next time.' And then sends a flood to destroy it all in one orgy of violence."

"Okay, I'll give you that. Sounds pretty rough."

"And didn't even do that dirty work himself. Sent one of his own children to do it."

"Ouch. You?"

Raphael shook his head. "One of the younger ones. I'm not sure if that makes it all better or worse. Uriel was never the same. Crueler, afterward. A joke with darkness in the punchline. He tried to kill Castiel, you know," he said, the whiplash catching Dean off guard. "I wasn't sure if you remembered that."

"No. No, I don't remember much of anything."

Raphael just gave him a sideways, oddly satisfied look. "As I said, I was a healer. I was the _first_ healer. I was the first of us to take a vessel and taught the elders of the humans fragments of what I knew. And then came the flood and I heard each of them die, one by one. As vanished as a shadow in a storm. I think that's when the questioning started for me."

He leaned back in the seat, his fingers laced behind his head. "Questioning is a cancer. I managed to contain it for a while. No one suspected." His smile widened. "Those times your father stormed out of the home, did he always come back?"

"Yeah? Of course he did."

"Now imagine he never does. Imagine he's gone without a trace and you and all your brothers and sisters have been hardwired to live and die on orders. It's very distressing." He was talking about heavy stuff but his voice stayed steady and calm, like this was a book he'd read once. "I think we all went mad. The lower caste of us fared better because they had their superiors to give them orders but the rest of us flailed for close to two thousand years. Some of my brothers even decided to jump start the apocalypse because it was something they knew would happen. Probably to get our Father's attention too, although I doubt Michael would ever admit it. It didn't succeed, in case you were wondering."

"You stayed out of that?"

"I had my own duties. When they failed I dedicated myself to complete their work."

"You wanted to _end the world_?"

"I still do," he said, as casually as if they were talking about the weather.

"...Why?"

"Michael thought about it like the terms of a contract. So it is written, so it must be done. " The smile widened a little bit more. "I just wanted to watch it all burn." Dean wondered what exactly he'd gotten himself involved with. "I thought God was dead, you know. I told Castiel as much once. Then I began to see His hand and I understood Lucifer as I never had before. I became obsessed with annihilating everything my Father held dear." A grim, resigned smile spread across his face. "As you can imagine, I overextended my reach and I had never felt the pure rage I did as when I woke up in Heaven and found myself alive again. Still surrounded by _this_," he said, gesturing around him as if the countryside was a garbage dump. "I want no part of it. And now I will finally be free."

888

Dean had wanted to drive the whole way but apparently even his adrenaline had limits; the third time he almost veered out of lane Sam grabbed the steering wheel from the backseat and guided the car over to the shoulder. After some grumbling – if Dean was driving at least he had something to do except _think_ – Dean finally made a show of giving in to Sam's demands that he not so much as _look_ at the steering wheel until he slept.

Dean would only move as far as the passenger seat though, kicking their creepy new friend to the backseat as Sam slid behind the wheel. Dean didn't like that Raphael didn't seem to be in much of a hurry but tried to put it out of his mind. There was nothing he could do about it in any case, especially since he and Sam were in so far above their pay grade already.

_Think about Cas. Worry about everything else once you're got him._ Repeating that like a mantra eased Dean's nerves a little, as much as possible, anyway. Cas needed him focused and needed him sharp. He touched the pommel of the sword he'd tucked into his belt. _On my way, Cas. Promise you that._

A few more miles passed in a bleary haze, until they hit a bump hard enough to jolt Dean back awake. He glared at Sam – who didn't even have the courtesy to apologize – then glanced up at the mirror to check on Raphael. The archangel seemed engrossed in the scenery and Dean stared out the window himself, trying to figure out what about featureless prairie could possibly be so fascinating.

"My eyes can see things yours can't," Raphael said, like Dean had been speaking aloud. "When I was younger and less jaded the pattern of life was a wonder. You could see the hand of God if you looked closely enough."

"Funny how you wound up wanting to wreck it."

"It's _why_ I wanted to wreck it, in actuality." He nodded to Dean. "You should take care with that."

Dean looked down to realize that sometime over the past twenty miles he's taken Castiel's feather out of his pocket. Dean held it to the light; the glossy luster was beginning to fade in a way that made Dean's chest seize if he even began to think about it. "Cas said the wings were because he couldn't make himself look the way he'd wanted."

"We don't have bodies as you would define them. Normally we would take human vessels to operate on Earth but that would be too easily tracked for one in Castiel's position. He was clever to find a different option," he said, the praise coming out almost grudging.

"Said he'd gotten the idea from someone else."

"Ah. That does make sense, then. And not surprising that he wouldn't be quite successful, if he was copying who I suspect. It's an advanced ritual that requires a great deal of power."

Dean held the feather in one tight fist as he looked back out the window, thinking about the way those wings looked draped across that piano. "I think Cas did just fine." He leaned his head against the window and closed his eyes, running the pad of his thumb over the edge of the feather as he tried to make sure that was the mental image that stayed in his head.

It didn't work. When the dreams did come they were charged and over intense like fever dreams, a recurring loop of a twilight forest and nightmare images, blood under his nails and things that looked like people (but weren't _people_, in the dream he knew that) looking up at him with fear in their eyes. Where's the angel? Dean heard himself ask in a voice that didn't at all sound like his, that same hard knot in his chest. _Where's the angel?_

Then the vague, repetitive nightmare snapped into laser sharp focus. Dean felt himself pushed to his knees, his hands bound tight behind his back. More than just his hands; each movement sent excruciating pain through his back and shoulders and Dean realized with a sick lurch this wasn't a dream at all. Someone pushed his...pushed _Cas'_ head down to the floor and he couldn't swallow back the sharp gasp of pain. "Why did you force this on us, Castiel?"

He looked up; through his eyes Dean saw a blonde woman wearing a suit standing in front of him. "Hester." Dean thought he sounded surprised. "You weren't who I'd been expecting." He shifted around, trying to find a comfortable position until he realized it was only making the bindings tighter. "Why you?"

"Instead of one of the many others you wronged?"

Castiel squeezed his eyes shut. "You remember."

"It's a burden I've been promised will be lifted shortly." She lifted his head up. "Why don't you want to come home? We can all be family again. _Whole_ again."

Castiel jerked his head away, hissing at the pain that sent down his spine. "I never could make you understand."

She crouched in front of him. "This is our second chance. For all of us. A chance to put the sin and pain in the past forever. Why would you run from that?" Castiel didn't answer. "Oh, of course. Free will." Dean felt Cas bristle at the disdain in her voice. "You were my captain once. I would have followed you into Hell itself. I did follow you into war. I volunteered for this last duty to see if there was any of that commander left."

"If Michael's sent you to kill me get on with it already."

"He considered that but I recommended something else. I was one of those who stood by you the first time, remember." Dean felt ice creep through Cas' veins, enough to eclipse the pain. "And I do understand. You've been sick for a long time, Castiel. So much longer than any of us realized. What you've done to yourself is more than enough proof of that," she said, touching his wing with a repulsed look on her face.

"There is nothing anyone can do to force me back to Heaven."

She smiled at him in a way that didn't look entirely sisterly. "They'll persuade you." She leaned forward to whisper in his ear. "We know how you break."

"No." The word came out in a desperate whimper. "It won't be like the last time."

"You're right. This time they'll make sure it sticks." She kissed his forehead. "I'll see you back home, brother."

Dean snapped awake, clutching the feather so tight his palm was bleeding.

888

Dean spent the next few hours of the drive in silence. Finally Raphael pointed to a bend in the road. "Turn here. We're very close now." A few minutes later Dean pulled to a stop in front of a derelict warehouse in an abandoned industrial park.

"You sure about this place?"

Raphael smiled again. "What do you see?"

"Crap," he said. "Lots and lots of crap."

"Allow me to illuminate." Raphael pressed two fingers against his temple, the same way Cas had when sending him out of the mansion.

When Dean opened his eyes again the warehouse had turned into a medieval castle, all hard, solid slabs of gray stone and sharp points on the battlements. "You sons of bitches don't do anything halfway, huh?"

"The garrison doesn't truly look like what you're seeing, either," Raphael said. "This is just the closest your mind can comprehend."

"I'm guessing there's a dungeon in there somewhere."

That was alarmingly close to a smirk on Raphael's face. "Of course. They couldn't take my poor brother back to Heaven as he is. The reconditioning must be complete or he'll spread the unfortunate infection he's been suffering from so long. Free will is not to be tolerated in any of my brother Michael's soldiers."

"If this is a do over why the hell would God set it up like this?"

"Yet another of the many questions for my Father I know He'll never answer. Are you both prepared?" Raphael said, turning around to look at Sam, who had been silent the entire ride. Sam didn't say anything now either, his eyes narrowed as he studied the scene in front of him and nodded.

Now or never. "Okay, then. Let's have some fun storming this castle."


	8. Chapter 8

Sam stretched his legs as he unfolded himself from the Impala's backseat. He winced as his phone buzzed again; Jess had been calling him every ten minutes, probably down to the second if he knew her the way he did. He'd been too cowardly to say anything to her when he'd left late last night; she slept like a rock and hadn't heard him get the call from Dean or been disturbed by him leaving. Seeing who he was dealing with now Sam wondered if there hadn't been anything more to that. Jess would have insisted on coming along, he knew her. If he was in trouble she was in trouble; she'd take one look at him and know how bad this was.

A part of Sam wished he'd woken her up. A bigger part of him knew the guy standing next to Dean now and the freaking castle in front of them was why he'd dreamed about her dying in flames long before they'd ever met. He never told anyone how long he'd been having that dream, not even Dean. He could see the rage coming off Dean in waves but Sam thought that if they survived all this he would find the first church he stumbled over, hit his knees and say a couple of hosannas that had stayed a dream.

Sam didn't like any of this. This was all coming too easy; maybe he was too used to looking for fine print but this seemed like there should be a whole lot more of it.

Dean and Raphael were talking strategy and Sam took the second to finally hit SEND on one of the many, many missed calls on his phone. "Oh my God, _finally_! Are you okay? Where are you?"

Well, this would be fun. "Kansas?"

"Kansas? Why?" He heard her take in a startled breath. "Did something happen to your brother?"

Sam looked over at Dean. "You could say that."

"Is he okay?"

"Wouldn't go quite that far."

"Are _you_ okay?"

"I wouldn't go that far either." He let out a long breath. "I love you, Jess. Loved you way longer than I ever realized."

She was quiet for a few moments. "How not okay are you right now?"

"Pretty not okay."

"I'm on the next plane. I'm going to be right there..."

"No! No, don't do that, it'll all be over by the time you get here."

"I'm already packing, Sam."

Sam knew that right there was why he was here. He _had_ his do over. He'd lucked out in ways he couldn't even imagine. If he spent the rest of his life benefiting from the same thing ripping his brother's heart out right now Sam knew the guilt would eat him up alive. "Marry me."

"I...what?"

"When this is over, we should get married. I mean, I have a ring, so..."

"Shut up. Yes, of course."

Sam hung up before she could say another tempting word. Maybe he shouldn't have called her in the first place but he realized that not telling her that had been a regret he'd been carrying around for more than one lifetime already. He knew deep in his bones he never got to ask that question the first time and no matter what happened here he was determined that was one cycle that wouldn't repeat.

"Sam! You good to go?"

For a fraction of an instant Sam had a ghostly impression of himself, more muscled, longer hair, absolutely sure of himself. Sam didn't think he liked that guy all that much but he didn't mind the quick visit now. "As I'll ever be."

He joined Dean and Raphael at the front door, Dean's practiced eye taking in the woodwork. "Y'know, whoever built this did kind of a shitty job."

Sam had no idea if it was true but it broke the tension like a string snapping. "Let's try to stay together, okay? I don't feel like getting lost in all this."

Sam wondered if his saying that was why he lost track of Dean the second they all stepped through the door.

888

"Sam!"

"Eyes on the prize," he heard Raphael say, one hand on Dean's shoulder. "We're about to have some very unpleasant company."

The words were barely out before the corridor was full of angels, enough to completely block the narrow passage. And something _else_ with them, a force that felt bigger than the building and shook the walls when it spoke. Its voice sounded alarmingly to Dean like his father's. "I know what you're here to do, Raphael. I won't allow it."

"Having trouble securing a vessel, Michael? That's very disappointing, I'd been hoping for a battle. I'm surprised you didn't try to sweet talk Winchester and stab me in the back." Dean didn't know what in the hell that meant and was positive he didn't want to know.

"The time for battles among ourselves is over. Why are you trying to reignite that war?"

"I'm following your lead, as always."

"Collecting our strays isn't a war."

"Cas isn't a _stray_," Dean said, cutting in. "All he wanted was for you jackasses to leave him alone."

He could _feel_ the thing turn to look at him. "If your own brother ran away are you telling me you wouldn't do everything in your power to bring him home?"

"I wouldn't make him bleed to do it."

"Maybe I care more about keeping my family together than you do, Dean."

"Entertaining as all this is," Raphael said, "between the two of us we know you've only ever cared about being the best soldier. Which is why you should let us through."

"It is our Father's will that we all be gathered in Heaven."

"How strange then that He sent Winchester to me." Michael didn't have a face and Dean could still tell he was surprised. "If he hadn't done so Winchester would never have found his way here, we both know that. You could have broken Castiel at your leisure instead of taking the brutal and sloppy route you have." Raphael took a step forward, mercifully keeping Dean too distracted to picture what that might mean. "If His will was truly for us all to be reunited, why would He do that?" He took another step forward. "Let me be plain with you. _Brother._ I am here for Castiel but I will be more than delighted to kill everyone foolish enough to get in my path. I think my history has proven I have no issue with taking a sword to each and every one of you," he said, sweeping his gaze over the assembled angels. "So what will it be, Michael? You can't fight me as you are. Will you stand the loss of all or step aside for me to do our Father's will?"

Like the air being sucked out of the room Dean felt that force disappear. The angels drew in on themselves, confusion settling over them like a fog. "We won't let you do this," said one of them, although Dean couldn't make out which brave idiot it was.

"I lied," Raphael said, putting one hand on Dean's shoulder. "I could kill you all, but I don't want to take the time."

When Dean opened his eyes they were in a different, very empty hallway. "The hell? If you could do that what was all the talking for?"

Raphael _smiled_ at him. "Don't you understand? I made Michael _question_." He chuckled to himself. "I almost regret not being able to see the results of that." He nodded down the empty hallway. "Shall we?"

888

Sam wandered around yet another winding corridor, almost hitting his head on one of the torches flickering on the wall. He didn't know why he hadn't seen anyone. From all indications the place should be crawling with angels (a part of Sam's mind was still _holy crap, angels!_, a much bigger part than he would ever admit out loud) but he hadn't seen anyone. It was spooky, how empty the place seemed and he hoped Dean was having better luck.

And like he'd conjured them into being Sam heard footsteps coming down the hall. There was nowhere to hide and Sam flattened himself against the wall, hoping the dim light would at least give him the benefit of surprise. He took out his father's old service revolver (Dean had insisted he take it, brandishing a silver sword he wouldn't let anyone touch and wouldn't talk about) and cocked it; he didn't know what good it would do but maybe he could at least buy Dean some time.

Then the three angels walked right by him, one close enough to brush against his jacket without any of them doing so much as looking his way. "All right seriously, the _hell_?"

"They can't see you."

Sam spun around and saw a man (probably not a man, Sam realized too late) leaning against the wall in a spot that had been vacant a second before. He was shorter than Sam, blond with a hawk nose, close-set eyes and a smirk that immediately got Sam's hackles up. "Take it that's because of you?"

"You could say thanks, at least. You Winchesters are always so ungrateful."

"Are you why I haven't seen anyone up until now, too?"

He shrugged. "It's not much fun if you get splattered all over the walls on the first play, y'know?"

Well, Sam supposed he _was_ grateful for the assist. "Thanks. I guess. Which one are you?"

The guy waved that off. "I've had a _bunch_ of names. We say my real one a lot of alarm bells go off, so let's keep that quiet right now."

"You remember." The man raised his chin, like he was trying to take Sam's measure. "They didn't know I was awake but I heard when Dean and Raphael were talking, I thought none of you were supposed to remember."

He shrugged again, looking immensely pleased with himself. "What's a story without at least one prodigal son? Although Castiel's been taking up that role for a long time now. No respect for his elders, that kid."

"Okay, look, this is all...really, really weird and all, but if you could tell me where I can find Dean..."

"He's gonna fail, you know."

Sam had already half turned away but the stranger had his full attention now. "What do you mean?"

"What I said. Dean's not going to be able to save Castiel. Already too late."

"Why are you telling me this?"

Another shrug. "Figured you'd want to know. You came all this way, after all."

Sam tried to picture his brother's face if he found Castiel too late and realized he could with alarming clarity. "What are you playing at? You have a reason, you have to."

The man smiled at him like a shark, all teeth and malice. "Always did like you, Sam. You're a smart guy. You think things through. Well, unless it involves your brother. I tried to teach you that once, that you might have to back away."

Sam felt a sudden, raw rush of fury that settled into a kind of sharp clarity. "When I was little and had nightmares Dean was the one I always went to. Not my mom, not my dad. Probably started to bug him after a while. I never told him that the dreams were always about me looking for him and not being able to find him. He was off somewhere and I would walk and walk and never get there. He locked eyes with the strange creature in front of him. "That wasn't a dream, it was a memory, wasn't it. Like the fire."

"You two remember a lot more than you should."

"Dean said it was scars."

"Yeah, guess you two would have some of those," he said, absently rubbing his chest.

"What do you want me to do?"

"What makes you think I want you to do anything?" Sam just gave him a look and he grinned. "Okay, you got me. I couldn't keep that up much longer anyway." He pulled out a silver short sword, one that looked like a match for the one Dean was carrying. "You know the terms your brother's working under, right?"

Sam nodded. "He won't go to Heaven."

"_Can't._ Can't go to Heaven. Slight difference there."

"I don't really see one."

The man tossed the sword from hand to hand. "It's can't. But here's the deal I'll make with you: you, Sam Winchester, can save the day. You can give your brother his happy ending and send him off into the sunset, but if you do it means you can't go to Heaven either."

Sam had expected the terms to be a little worse than that. "That's it?"

The man looked wounded. "Look, that's a pretty big deal."

"Yeah? From what Dean told me Cas doesn't seem that crazy about it. Considering we're having this conversation I'm betting you're not either."

"Got me there. But it is a pretty big deal. Think it over."

There was one part of it worth thinking about. "That means Jess will get to go and I won't. Mom and Dad, too. I won't get to see them, either."

"That's about the whole of it."

"I mean...will they know?"

The guy hesitated for a second, like he was about to say something smart ass and thought better of it. "Nah. No one misses anyone in Heaven. And anyway, if you two are really 'meant to be', who know how things shake out?"

Sam nodded. He remembered how happy Dean had sounded during that phone call, the one before this all went bad, and suddenly the decision wasn't very hard at all. "Dean needs me. No way I'm letting him down."

The guy rolled his eyes. "Man, you Winchesters. Zachariah was so right about you two." He motioned Sam to come closer. "Gimme your hand."

Sam did as he was told and the man drew the blade of the sword across his palm without even a word of warning; Sam winced and flinched back, holding his bloody palm in his other hand. "Why'd you do that?"

"Shhhh. Look." Sam did and saw that the blade of the sword was glowing, spirals of white light trailing around the blade. "You know what that is, Sammy boy?" Sam shook his head. "That's your soul. A piece of it, anyway." He handed Sam the sword and when Sam looked down he saw his hand had healed. "You should probably hold onto this now."

Sam watched the light swirl, almost able to see images in it: his mother's smile, Jess' engagement ring, before the light disappeared into the blade. "Why are you helping us," he said. "The truth."

"What can I say?" he said with an almost embarrassed shrug. "Apparently I was kind of a role model to Castiel. Have to admit, that's kind of flattering even if I did have a lot more fun than he ever could. Wish I'd known what he was up to, we could have had a time of it. And the last thing I did to him was play a prank and I guess I feel kind of bad. Maybe. Don't tell anyone I said that." He sighed. "Besides, I _did_ promise to help you two and didn't get that chance, so now we're all even there."

"They'll hunt you for this. The way they did with your brother."

There was that smile again. "The only one who could ever find me is locked up nice and tight now, so I'm not too worried."

"What are you going to do?"

Another shrug. "I hear India's nice this time of year. I mean, I know it is, used to go all the time. Won't be the same, but..." He let the words trail off. "I'm getting the feeling from the bunch of you that the old man's kind of a romantic. Maybe I'll be surprised. Got some groveling to do if I am." He nodded to Sam. "Get moving. You don't want to miss the show."

888

Dean hadn't expected an _actual_ dungeon. Maybe he should have. Or he should stop expecting things altogether, that seemed like a decent plan too.

There were sets of manacles lining the wall, plaques set above each written in a script Dean couldn't read. He wondered if they were names. Maybe more of Cas' brothers and sisters had taken his cue than he'd given them credit for.

Which meant Michael would have wanted to make an example. There were blood streaks along one wall and scuffs on the floor; when Dean touched one of the streaks it was long dry, flecks of rust colored blood coming off on his fingers.

He felt Raphael at his elbow. "Around the next corner."

Dean nodded, swallowing hard. When he got to the bend he paused for a moment, taking a deep, deep breath. It didn't help, the stench of blood was too strong. He had another wave of deja vu and knew there had been a time in his previous life where he'd been used to that smell.

Then Dean took that one step around the corner and felt his hands ball up into fists. Castiel was manacled to the wall and Dean had been right that they'd go for his hands; even though he was already bound someone had taken long nails and driven them through his palms and right into the stone walls. Right about the wings, too – whole sections had been flayed off and Dean could see breaks in the exposed bone. Patches of feathers had been torn out, littering the floor and sitting in the congealed puddles of blood. An ugly part of him Dean had never known existed knew they'd been pulled out one by one. Like it was how he'd do it.

But what was important was bloody and beaten or not, Cas was breathing. Dean knelt over him and cradled his head up, taking in the swelling and bruises and wondering just how many broken bones Cas had. "Hey. Hey, wake up," he whispered. Dean kissed him, gently enough that he hoped it wouldn't hurt. "We're gonna get you out of here."

Cas whimpered, shivering and trying to cringe away until Dean kissed him again. "It's me, Cas. You're okay now. Or you're gonna be, anyway."

"Dean?" Cas' voice was fragile and scared and Dean didn't ever want to hear him like that again. He opened his eyes and Dean thought he looked every bit as astonished as he had when Dean had surprised him at the piano. "How could you be...how..." he stuttered, fighting for air. "Please don't be a trick."

"Shh, shh. Take it easy. Had some help." Dean looked up to see Raphael step forward, a smile on his face.

Dean didn't expect Cas' eyes to go this wide. "Dean, run," he said, flinching back against the wall.

Raphael crouched beside him. "Quiet, brother. I've been looking for you for a long time."

He pressed one hand to Cas' forehead and the wounds disappeared, closing up as Dean watched, even the blood fading. The nails disappeared and Cas flexed his hands, staring at them like they were someone else's, then he stretched out his healed wings. "I don't understand."

Dean struck the manacles with the sword and they fell apart like paper. When he pulled him to his feet Cas swayed a little bit but stayed up and Dean wrapped him in the tightest hug he could manage. "Don't _ever_ do this to me again."

Cas pressed his face against Dean's neck. "I'll try my best," he He felt Castiel lift his head to look over his shoulder. "Why did you help me?" he said to Raphael. "Heal me? I don't understand."

Dean stepped to the side, catching sight of Sam slipping around the corner; before he could saw anything Sam put one finger in a _shh_ motion across his lips. Dean blinked and a group of angels, the ones he'd seen with Michael, appeared with a flourish of wings. "Guys. Company."

Raphael turned around and casually gestured at them, a wall of shimmering force slamming into place. "I didn't want to face you broken and bloody, Castiel. It wouldn't be fitting," he said, as if they hadn't been interrupted.

Dean saw the silver blade in Raphael's hand an instant too late. Before Dean could so much as shout a warning Raphael grabbed Castiel by the hair and swung his sword in a wide arc, driving it up to the hilt just under Castiel's rib cage. "I believe this is called payback," he said right into Castiel's ear as Cas started to choke, blood trickling from the corner of his mouth. "I thought about smiting you again but I wanted to see the look on both of your faces." He let Castiel drop and turned to face Dean, blood dripping from the tip of his sword. "Now you."

Dean rushed him in a fury, Cas' sword drawn but Raphael swatted him away, sending his sword flying. When Dean went for him again he managed to get Raphael's sword away and Raphael smiled. "That is the one you want," he said, spreading his arms wide. "If you dare, Winchester."

Dean dared. He kept waiting for Raphael to sidestep, put up an attack, and it didn't even occur to Dean until he'd buried the sword in Raphael's chest that he'd given the archangel exactly what he'd wanted. Raphael jerked once as the blade went in, bracing himself against Dean's shoulder. "End it," he whispered, light circling his irises.

A part of Dean didn't want to. A sick, _old_ part of Dean wanted draw this out, make this _miserable_ son of a bitch suffer.

But the simple truth was that Dean had more important things to do. He twisted the sword once and pulled it out, letting Raphael drop. The archangel screamed once, a harsh, piercing sound, but there was a smile on his face as the light exploded out and black wings drew themselves into the stone.

Dean didn't stick around for the show. Light was swirling around Castiel as Dean knelt beside him, his chest jerking in desperate, uneven gasps. "Shh, Cas," Dean whispered. "I gotcha. I'm here. This time I'm here."

Cas' head turned toward his voice as Dean cradled him up, a faint smile on his lips as he touched Dean's face. "I'm not sorry I called you," he whispered.

"Dean." Dean turned around and locked eyes with Sam. "Grab him." The sword in Sam's hand was glowing and Dean didn't understand. _Trust me_, Sam mouthed, and that was all Dean needed.

He got to his feet and pulled Cas up with him, holding him tight, and if Dean didn't know what the hell was going on Cas sure seemed to. "Dean, _no_," he said, trying to pull away. "Don't let..."

"Cas, _shut up_." Then Dean kissed him, tasting blood as he held him up. If this really was their last handful of seconds, then this was damn sure how Dean was going to spend it.

888

Sam heard that strange angel's voice in his head as Raphael drove his sword into Castiel's chest. _Not yet._ He forced himself to hold still as Dean took out Raphael, watching light spiral out of Castiel the same way it had spiraled into the sword when he'd been slashed. _Now you're getting it._ And in a moment of what Sam could only call revelation he saw exactly what he needed to do. It was so simple.

Completely _nuts_, but simple. "Dean." Dean's head whipped around, terror bright in his wide eyes and seeing Dean like that took away any last bits of hesitation. "Grab him." Dean's expression clouded and Sam knew they were running out of time. _Trust me_ he mouthed, not even realizing he'd done it until he saw that hope shine in his brother's eyes. Sam adjusted the grip on his sword as Dean pulled Castiel up and kissed him full on the lips.

Then Sam gritted his teeth and rushed forward, burying the point of his sword into his brother's back all the way through into Castiel's chest.

The rush of energy almost flattened him. In the second he could _see_ Dean's soul, like a bright coat of paint hiding a spiderweb of old cracks, a whirlwind of anger and love and desperate fear, and beyond that Castiel faint and fading away. He felt Dean whisper _I love you, Cas_ and thought of Jess, the nightmare of watching her burn in front of his eyes and knew he would rather die right here than watch Dean lose out on this second chance. He felt Dean's soul line up with his, like he'd caught on with what Sam was doing, then they both reached for Castiel and _pulled_.

This time the explosion of force really did knock Sam off his feet, off his feet and all the way out.

When he opened his eyes again the castle was gone and the sky was blue above him. He looked around saw Dean and Castiel next to him, both alive and breathing. _Not bad, Sam_, he heard, and Sam thought he pretty much had to agree.


	9. Epilogue

Dean knew the house had been wrecked but man. The house was _wrecked_. "At least the foundation's still solid," Dean said, trying to put a good spin on things. "Otherwise I'd say torch it and collect the insurance."

"I don't have insurance," Cas said, looking at the hole one of the jerk angels had torn through his roof. "I never needed it. I could keep things in repair with my will."

"That's not gonna come back, huh."

Castiel shook his head. "The wards were a part of me. When they broke it was..." His lips pressed into a thin line. "It felt like they'd torn off one of my arms."

"You're alive and we've all got all our limbs. Let's keep this positive." He kept on surveying the room, the estimate in his head still ticking away. "And this can be fixed it's just...y'know, gonna take awhile. I can't do it all, but I'm guessing at least your funds are real."

Castiel nodded. "Knowing the future can be profitable at times. But I don't have as much as all of this would have suggested."

"Yeah, betting you have enough. Tell the world about one of those Van Goghs and we can build you a new money bin." The way Cas' wings went tight over his back told him what he thought of that idea. "Sam wants to bring Jess down so we'd better get this place together."

"How is Sam?"

"Quiet. All over his girl. Think his priorities got a little more centered." Dean fixed one of the tilted paintings. "Guess when you know there's nothing waiting after you die it makes you live in the moment."

"Is that what you think happened?"

"Isn't it? Got told by a pretty high source that we wouldn't go to Heaven. Rather think we'd not go anywhere than, y'know, downstairs."

"You _don't_ understand." Cas had stopped looking mournfully at all of this wrecked things and was staring wide-eyed at him.

"Then tell me. You've been quiet, too."

Cas sat on the floor, leaning against what was left of the bench Dean had made him. "I don't know how – although I have a working theory as to _who_ – but when Sam stabbed us it mixed your souls and my Grace together. My Grace was dying and your souls stabilized me. And in return I...we're all connected. You and Sam can't go to Heaven because you can't really die. I don't age. The two of you still will and you'll die eventually, but then you'll be reborn. You and Sam will always be brothers, Dean."

It felt like it took an eternity for Dean to feel like he could breathe again. "Hell, Cas. That sounds like Heaven to me." He knelt over and kissed him. "So we're really talking forever, then."

"With breaks. Reincarnation can be unpredictable." He closed his eyes, one hand over his chest. "If you hold your breath you may be able to feel the connection. I can."

Dean thought he could, too. "That's gonna suck for you, though. Watching that and all."

"I've seen worse. I've done worse."

"Here's the deal though." Cas' blue eyes looked up at him. "I get reborn, don't wait so fucking long to find me this time."

"You won't even remember me."

"Cas, if all this has proven anything it's that literal acts of _God_ won't stop me remembering you. Find me."

"If you'll want me to."

Dean kissed him until he made that breathless little sound Dean could never get enough of. "Never say something that stupid again. You hear me?"

Cas nodded, that dazed smile on his face. Dean got up – the room was too big a mess to go at it there – and took a look at the bench Cas was leaning against. "I could fix that pretty easy, at least."

Castiel cast a bleak look at his piano. "We'd have to fix that first."

"So that's the priority." Castiel heaved himself to his feet and touched the keys, pulling out some ugly tones from the mangled instrument. He tried the sequence again, his brow furrowed and Dean leaned against the wall watching. "Y'know, Cas, you've got a little bit of soul now. You could try to write music yourself if you want."

Castiel's hand paused over the keys."What if I'm terrible at it?"

"Then I'll mock the hell out of you." When Cas glared at him Dean kissed him up against the wall, mostly to keep him from asking if Dean really would. "Seriously. No more hundreds of years locked up in here," he said. "I die, you wait, like twenty years and you come find me. Cause I'm gonna be looking for you."

Castiel nodded. "You have my word."

Dean buried his hands deep in Cas' feathers. "Anyway, we won't have to worry about that for, like fifty years, right?"

"If we're very lucky."

Dean kissed him hard enough to let him feel the promise of all the years ahead of him. "Cool. Now what do you say the two of us break in the backseat of one of your fancy cars?"

888

_100 Years Later_

Castiel leaned against the Impala's glossy hood. Dean had spared no time and effort teaching Castiel how to maintain his baby and the car was spotless, perfectly restored inside and out – although not exactly factory restored. Restored to an ideal level; a scratch on the fender here, a frayed upholstery seam there. There was a lifetime of memories in that car and Castiel didn't want to erase any of them.

The scheme had been Dean's. It was a good one, from what Castiel could see; he knew he might be looking at the last '67 Impala in existence and if there was something that could kindle something reckless in the soul of Dean Winchester, it would be this car.

Well, the last name wasn't Winchester anymore, Castiel knew he couldn't hope to be so lucky twice in a row. The first name was still Dean, though how and why were questions Castiel couldn't even begin to answer. If the picture was accurate Dean even looked like himself, complete with a younger brother who looked remarkably like Sam.

It had been two days since he'd sent the advertisement of an Impala for sale, and two months since he started searching in earnest. Before that he'd waited twenty-five years. Twenty-five had seemed like a good number.

Castiel didn't think he could wait one more day. "You said you would be looking," he said, stroking one hand fondly against the hood of the car. "And I've taken care of her the way I promised."

He crossed his arms, feeling the promise of life beginning again hovering almost within his grasp. "I've been waiting, Dean. Find me."


End file.
